January 30, 2011

Coconut-Lime Cupcakes January 20, 2011

On January 20th, 2011 we were blessed with a winter storm. I know, I know...I usually don't consider a winter storm a blessing but this one allowed me to stay home and make these wonderful Coconut-Lime Cupcakes for my aunt's birthday. Oh they were soooo good. In fact, one of my cousins was jealous she didn't get any so I promised I'd make her some when she came to visit us. Naturally, she loved them!


What can I say? They speak for themselves. Coconut-lime cupcakes with coconut frosting...mmmm. Here's a visual to help you out.

Yes, that's a pretty big mug, noooo the cupcake isn't actually that tiny.

Here's my progress, in pictures of course.


First, I baked my cupcakes and cored them with a cute little gadget I got at Williams & Sonoma. It's called the Cuisipro Cupcake Corer. You can click on the above link to go to their webpage. It's a fantastically simple tool, hand operated, easy to wash and it works great on standard size cupcakes or muffins. I haven't tried using it on jumbo cupcakes, so I cannot say how well it would do with such a large medium. I really like that it's quick and simple to operate.

Cuisipro Cupcake Corer 


Then I filled them with some wonderful lime curd. First time I've ever made any kind of curd. Truthfully, making lime curd always sounded like a daunting task. In my head I was always thinking "that sounds like it would be very complicated to make and it probably takes a lot of time." In reality it's fairly simple and actually quite easy to make. My next flavor of curd that I plan on making is grapefruit. Yep, you heard me, grapefruit curd. There's a nice recipe that actually sounds interesting enough that I'm just going to have to try it to say I at least attempted it, and either liked it or not. I'm actually hoping that I'll like it. I'm not a big grapefruit fan at all.


Finally I piped coconut buttercream frosting on them and then sprinkled coconut flakes on top of the buttercream.  Absolutely lovely cupcakes and the only person that wrinkled their nose up at them was my boyfriend. After 7 years together he finally says he doesn't like lime. Go figure!


January 1, 2011

Chai & Honey Cupcakes

I got a new cupcake "cookbook" if you will, on my birthday and decided to make one of the recipes for a get-together on New Year's Eve. They looked simple to make and I've always wanted to try making chai flavored cake. I used one of the new teas I bought at Teavana so I didn't have to use 3 servings worth, I only used 2 but brewed it according to the recipe directions.

Baking was a tad worrisome because there was some kind of liquid bubbling up out of the middle of every cupcake. I suspect it was part of the honey that was in the batter (the batter was very runny too.) I put them back in the oven and let them bake a couple minutes longer. That seemed to do the trick. I cooled them and then made the honey whipped cream topping right before we were to leave for the party. Transporting them "frosted" wouldn't have worked out too well so I finished them once we arrived. They looked and tasted really good!