Vanilla Cupcakes with Milk Chocolate Ganache

I mentioned in my last post, that my father had turned fifty two. Like most men, he is ridiculously difficult to buy for, and when I asked him if he wanted anything, he told me just to write Happy Birthday on a piece of paper. Well, that didn't happen; I got him a proper card, and decided to bake him a whole heap of his favourite baked item. Cupcakes. And by 'a whole heap', I mean eight dozen. That's right. Eight Dozen.

My father loves cupcakes. He also hates icing. That makes it easy when it comes to freezing them (and most of this extra large batch were frozen), but it also makes them very boring. So I grabbed a dozen and iced them for my mother and me. Although, in saying that, I do love a plain cupcake seconds out of the oven, when the top is slightly crunchy and the inside is all air and light. Yum.

Vanilla Cupcakes.

125g butter
1/4 cup caster sugar
1tsp vanilla essence
1 cup flour
2 eggs
3tsp baking powder
2 - 3 tbsp milk

1. Cream the butter and sugar. Room temperature butter is best for this, but I very rarely remember to take it out and measure it before I want to bake, so I just zap it in the microwave for a little bit.

2. Mix in all the dry ingredients.

3. Eggs and vanilla go in now - don't beat too much, just enough to combine. 

4. Start adding in the milk a little bit at a time - you may not need all the milk. The cake batter should look quite light and fluffy, with lots of air bubbles when you spoon it out of the bowl and into the papers.




5. Spoon into cases and then put into the oven at 180 degrees celcius until they are done. Test them the way you would any other cake - touch gently and if they bounce back quickly, they're done.


Ready to go into the oven.


Cupcake tower!


Tower close up.

Milk Chocolate Ganache:

200g milk chocolate buttons.
1/4 cup heavy cream.

1. In a saucepan, heat chocolate and cream over low heat until the chocolate is melted and well combined. You want it to be quite thick and glossy.



2. Put into an piping bag and ice.


Sitting pretty.

Extra Chocolate Red Velvet Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Icing

I am cursed with need to bake at obscure times, like at eight pm after I got home from work. Usually when I find something that looks like fun to try. In this case, it was red velvet cupcakes. Now, in New Zealand, red velvet cake is about as common as flying pigs. The first three people I informed of my current baking mission just stared at me as if I was mad; clearly trying to understand why I sought to combine cake and furry fabric. And I managed to do it! No, not really.

This is the first time I've made red velvet cake of any sort, so I really had no idea what I was in for. Turns out, something surprisingly easy. These wee cakes take only just a little more effort than your average vanilla cupcakes, and they are amazingly delicious. The flavour is subtly chocolately, and the cake itself is silky soft and slightly dense in texture. Just perfect for those of you who aren't huge fans the traditional slightly-dry, air-light cupcake.

Now, I can't say I'm a huge fan of cream cheese icing as I prefer my icing to do as I tell it. However, the flavour really suits the subtleness of the cake, so I wouldn't go so far as to recommend not using it at all. I think a traditional all-sugar frosting would be too overwhelming for the delicate flavour of the cake. So next time I whip these cakes up (and there will be a next time), I will probably reduce the amount of cream cheese I use, so that the flavour is still there, but so that there is still a decent amount of structure to the frosting.

The inspiration from the recipe came from here. Unfortunately my first time efforts don't look as great as Michelle's, but I am all for that slightly rustic look to my cooking. That's what I tell myself, at least.

Without further ado!

Red Velvet Cupcake Recipe:

Makes 12 average sized cupcakes, or 24 small cupcakes.

2/3c Oil (vegetable or cooking)
3/4c Sugar
1 egg
2tbsp red food colouring*
1tsp vanilla extract
1/2c buttermilk**
1c flour
1/3c cocoa***
1/2tsp baking soda
1/2tsp baking powder
3/4tsp white vinegar
*You could easily get away with more if you wanted a deeper red colour.
**If you don't have butter milk, you can make your own with 2tsp of lemon juice to half a cup of milk, and let it sit for 15 minutes so that it can curdle.
***I wanted a stronger chocolate flavour (because I'm a chocaholic), so I used 1/2c instead. Of course, this does make the cake darker, so you don't get that fabulous red colour.

Method:


Dump your oil and sugar into a bowl, and mix on a low speed.


Next, add your egg, red food colouring and vanilla extrat.


Mix (still on low, so as not to splatter the liquidly mixture)


Add your buttermilk, flour, cocoa, baking soda and baking powder.


Mix (you can turn the speed up here, but I didn't bother)


Line your muffin pans with cupcake liners. I made 24 smaller cupcakes, because I find they are a much more forgiving serving size, plus they look totally cute. As you can see, I use silicone bake ware. There are only a few things I use silicone for; muffins and Bundt cakes. I just can't be bothered with attempting to coax cakes out of tricky moulds.


Pop them into your preheated oven at 180 degrees Celsius, cooking them until they bounce back from a touch, or a skewer/toothpick comes out clean. Because they are a little denser than traditional cupcakes, they take a bit longer.


Here they are in all their freshly bake beauty! Yummmm.

Cream Cheese Frosting Recipe:
115g cream cheese*
115g butter
1 1/2tsp vanilla extract**
1-2c icing sugar (/powdered sugar/confectioners’ sugar - whatever you want to call it!)

*Remember earlier? When I said I'd probably cut the cream cheese down? Apply here.
**Extract is different to essence. It's the real stuff. If you can, get the stuff with the seed pods included (because ohmygod, they are amazing). Or alternatively you can do what Michelle has done, and use real vanilla seeds, and vanilla essence.

Method:


Weigh out your cream cheese (aren't these fantastic retro scales? They are my faaavourite Christmas present, and even though I have electric scales that measure in one gram increments, I always, always, always use these).


Then weigh out your butter (I just weighed the cream cheese, then tossed in enough butter so that the needle on the scales doubled - because you need the same amount for each ingredient).


Toss both cream cheese and butter in a bowl, and you vanilla extract. I added a few drops of red food colouring here, because I wanted a soft pink icing. If you look really closely, you can see the vanilla seeds. Mmmm.


Cream the ingredients until they are evenly mixed together and nice and fluffy.


Then add your icing sugar and mix. I would recommend that you add one cup first, then slowly add more until you get a texture you're happy with. If it ends up too thick, just add a few drops of milk. Be careful not to add to much, as we know what liquid can do to icing sugar!


Finally, put the icing in a piping bag, and ice away!

And these are the delicious results!



Inside (see how mine are darker than the traditional red velvet cake?).