Cookies & Cream Cupcakes

This project starts by making chocolate cupcakes. The recipe I chose was a chocolate buttermilk cake, it uses Dutch processed cocoa and has been tweaked to make only exactly 12 cupcakes. On this day I could not possibly need more than 12 cupcakes. So use whichever chocolate cake recipe you're fondest of, or here's one from me if you don't feel much like looking too far.

While said chocolate cupcakes of choice are baking is the perfect time to assemble your filling and frosting. I filled mine with bittersweet chocolate mousse and frosted them with cookies and cream buttercream. Filling is an extra step and of course not necessary, but come on, why wouldn't you?  

Cookies and Cream Frosting
1/2 cup butter - room temp
1/4 cup whole milk - room temp (plus a little extra for later)
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 pound confectioners sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
15 cream filled chocolate cookies of choice (here's where I admit that I went with neither the name nabisco or newman brands. I decided to take this adventure late Thursday night and the closest store to me is actually a gas station where they only sell giant generic packages of double-filled-shure-fine-stuffed-chocolate-sandwich-cookies. so that's what I got. no rules)

Beat butter until creamy, add milk and vanilla and beat until well combined. Add confectioners sugar and salt beating on low until combined, then increase speed to high. Continue to beat until frosting is light and fluffy. Break cookies into bits and add them to the frosting with mixer running. They will continue to break up into smaller pieces. (In case you're wondering, adding the cookies directly to the mixer bowl seemed to work better than giving them a whirl in the 'ol food processor because all of that double cream filling really wanted to stick to the side of the processor and gum things up. Been there, done that.) After cookies have been sufficiently combined and crumbled, you may want to add a few more Tablespoons of milk to get a lighter, pipe-able, frosting consistency. I did.

Ok. Now you have all of the pieces of the puzzle. Here's what to do with them:

 Get all of your ingredients together and your work area ready.

Make a filling space in each cupcake by cutting the middle portion out with a paring knife. Wait! Don't eat the middle parts! You'll need them in a little bit.

Fill that space with something. I used chocolate mousse. Maybe you'll use a cookie, or pudding, or mousse, or ganache. I don't know, anything could happen.

Put a cap on it. This is what those middle parts are for! As you can see from the photo, I needed to size the middle parts down so the caps would fit back on. This means there are some chocolate cake scraps to snack on after all.

Pipe or spread frosting on. I garnished mine with a broken bit of cookie. Cookie crumbs would be nice too...

A Cake Taken Apart

You didn't think the little one on the top got cut first, did you? I've been working on some edits, updates and newness here on my baking portfolio site. A little bit at a time.

Wednesday the 13th is the new Friday the 13th

This is my friend Steve:

He was born on October the 13th, and chances are that he's done way more cool shit than you.

The first time I met Steve he was wearing a breakdancing Fat Bald Men t-shirt, a brown UPS hat, and he had a pony tail. True story. Steve worked for my dad at my family's store in Ithaca, NY. About 10 years later Steve would be helping my dad and some friends and I move a piano into my house and, while carrying a too heavy thing down too many stairs, confess to my father that many of the hours he spent "working" for my dad were actually comprised of talking shit with my cousin and sneaking Strawberry Quick in the beer cooler.

Steve and I share stories of misadventure that span the country a few times over and could easily fill a lengthy novel. We've disagreed as many times as we've come to one another's rescue, and we've shown up with as much unconditional love and compassion as we've been cranky, bratty and mean to each other.

I have learned through Steve Crandall the true meaning of friendship, and am grateful and glad every single day for his presence in my life.

In honor of Steve - because I'm totally glad he was born, and because I can't be there to make him chocolate cake in person, I'm sharing with the world a list that I shared with him a little while back.

Ten important things I learned from Steve Crandall

10) Cops, meter maids, and tow truck drivers should not be trusted.

9) Almost anything is possible, or at least worth a shot, if it turns out to be impossible move on to the next thing.

8) Gnomes love to loiter.
7) When you're about to fight, hand someone you know your glasses and your wallet.
6) Life's a beach.
5) Occasionally it's important to take the local roads instead of the highway.

4) , 5, 6 wins. Always.

3) Strawberry Quick is awesome, but if you drink too much of it your stomach will hurt.

2) If you go streaking wearing only a cape and a mask you will get arrested.

1) Have fun every day.

Steve is someone that I admire and respect, someone who's life and advice I consider when making major decisions in my own. If you would have told me in 1993 that I would be learning some of the most important lessons of my life from the dude with a ponytail sneaking Strawberry Quick in the cooler, I never would have believed you. I guess that's just how life goes.

Love you Steve. Happy Birthday, and thanks for all of the good times!

Baking for art's sake

Some of my friend Phil's illustrations are on display at Homegrown this month. The illustrations are amazing and you should go look at them in person. There was an opening reception for the show at the end of last week and I baked cookies. A little sugar to accompany cheap wine and PBR seemed in order. Right? Right!

It's fun baking for events and people that I like. Phil and I met up a week or two before the show to talk about the work he was hanging and what kind of sweets he might want. He basically told me I could make whatever I wanted while also mentioning that he likes cut out cookies. I decided on apple shaped sugar cookies with salty sweet buttercream frosting (of the green variety).

I thought the apple would be funny because apples symbolize so many different things: youth; love; immortality (forbidden fruit); health (an apple a day...); cities; computers. So why not a cookie at an art opening. They were really fun to make, and sugar cookies in fun shapes are always fun to eat. So it was pretty much a win - win situation in the end.

I told Phil I made 100 cookies but I really made a 115. No telling where the 15 that didn't make it to the art show went.

Oh Baby Baby

My Saturday morning assignment was a woodland themed baby shower cake to serve 50 plus people.

Woodland themed? ...Yes!

Baking is a glorious way to spend any morning and I had so much fun making this cake.

Inside, the hexagon was a vanilla bean butter cake filled with mocha buttercreme. The outside was covered in espresso and semi-sweet chocolate ganache (and woodland critters, of course).

C'mon. Those little critters are CUTE.