Bacon Blueberry Pancake Cupcakes

While flipping through The Cupcake Diaries early this week, a recipe caught my eye - Bacon Blueberry Pancake Cupcakes. I wasn't sure whether to cringe or not because I'd never considered bacon as a cupcake ingredient. My curiosity got the better of me though, and I knew that I had to try these cupcakes, if for no other reason than to discover whether or not they were as gross as a little part of me imagined they could be (for the record, they were most definitely not gross).

I was not exactly sure what to expect with these. They had the potential to go one of two ways - delicious, or disgusting. They fared on the delicious side, as I was pleasantly surprised to find. The flavours go surprisingly well together, the cupcakes stay moist due to the maple syrup in them, and the salty bacon is offset nicely by the sweet blueberries. I highly recommend that you all give these a try! And, in hindsight, considering my love of breakfast foods, I'm not sure how I could have doubted these little gems.

This recipe will make you 24 cupcakes, for which you'll need:
6 slices maple bacon
1 3/4 cup plus 1 tsp sugar
2 1/2 cups flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
2 large eggs, at room temperature
2 1/4 tsp vanilla extract
Seeds from 1 vanilla bean (or an additional 1-2 tsp vanilla)
1 1/4 cups milk, at room temperature
1/2 cup pure maple syrup
1/2 cup fresh blueberries

Maple Cream Cheese Icing:
1/2 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
12 oz cream cheese (1 1/2 sticks)
8 cups icing sugar
1/2 cup maple syrup
1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees, and line muffin pans with baking cups or grease them to avoid sticking. Fry the bacon until very crunchy, sprinkle with the 1tsp of sugar, and then remove from the heat, strain the grease, and chop up into fine bits. Set the bacon aside for use later. Next, sift together the flour, baking powder, and salt, and set it aside as well.

Place the butter and sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer and beat on medium speed until well incorporated. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing slowly after each. Combine the vanilla, vanilla bean seeds (if using) and milk in a liquid measuring cup. Reduce the mixer speed to low and alternately add the flour and milk mixtures, stopping to scrape the sides as needed. Mix slowly until just combined. Add the maple syrup, mixing slowly. Then, using a spatula, gently fold the bacon bits and blueberries into the batter.

Scoop the batter into baking cups and bake for 18-20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the centre of a cupcake comes out clean. Allow the cupcakes to cool entirely.

For the frosting, combine all the ingredients in the stand mixer and beat until smooth and well combined. Turn the mixer to high speed for a couple of minutes at the end to get a light, whipped icing. Ice the cooled cupcakes as desired, and voila!

Let me know what you think of these cupcakes! The great thing about them is that, you could conceivably legitimize eating them for breakfast. Bacon, blueberry pancakes, maple syrup, cream cheese - all legitimate breakfast foods. And what could be better for breakfast than dessert? I have yet to discover an answer to that. Maybe you could make these into your Sunday morning family breakfast. I'm sure they'll thank you for it!

If you're considering bacon in your dessert, here are a few other options if blueberry isn't for you (and please let me know the results if you try any of these!):
Maple Bacon Cupcakes
Maple French Toast and Bacon Cupcakes
Bacon Cupcakes: Sunny Side Up
Chocolate Bacon Cupcakes

Enjoy the weekend, and please feel free to subscribe to the blog or visit the Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube pages for more delicious updates!

Pink Lemonade Cupcakes

Here it is, lovelies: a long awaited (and hopefully much anticipated) post about Pink Lemonade Cupcakes! When I say long awaited, what I mean is that this post is coming to you much later in the week than usual. For that I apologize, but let me tell you that it was completely worth my while to put this post off. I read 1055 pages, or 3 books, over the course of the last three days. That's the entire Hunger Games trilogy. Worth every minute I put the rest of my tasks on hold.

Having said that, thank you for waiting! I hope that you enjoy these cupcakes as much as I did because they were completely fantastic! I found the original recipe via Pinterest. They stayed extremely moist (although they were a bit sticky) and the glaze was a welcomed change from the usual vast amounts of frosting. These were also a great way to welcome the warm weather we've been having. I'm generally against using cake mix, but for these I've made an exception!

For the cupcakes, you'll need:

1 package lemon cake mix
1 package instant lemon pudding mix
4 eggs
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup pink lemonade concentrate
4 drops pink food colour (optional)
Additional 1 cup pink lemonade concentrate
1/2 cup sugar

For the glaze, you'll need:
1/4 cup butter
2 cups icing sugar
2 tbsp cream
1/2 tsp vanilla

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees and line two muffin pans with paper liners. In a large bowl, combine the cake and pudding mixes, eggs, vegetable oil, milk, food colour, and first portion (1/2 cup) of lemonade concentrate. Beat all of the ingredients together and then pour into the prepared muffin pans. Bake for approximately 20 minutes.

Once the cupcakes are baked, and have cooled ever so slightly, combine the second portion of lemonade concentrate and the sugar. Poke holes, using a fork, in the surface of the cupcakes and then pour the sugar and lemonade mixture over the cupcakes so that the liquid enters the holes in the cupcakes. This will keep the cupcakes extremely moist (although fair warning, they will be sticky).

Once the cupcakes have cooled completely, prepare the glaze. Melt the butter in a saucepan over medium heat. Once it is completely melted, pour the butter over the icing sugar in a large bowl. Add the cream and then beat the ingredients together until smooth, adding the vanilla if desired. Spread a thin layer of the glaze over the cupcakes.

Once the cupcakes are ready, enjoy! They are the perfect summer cupcake. They're a little bit sweet and a little bit refreshing and a lot delicious. This was my first time making a glaze for any sort of cake so I was happy with how it turned out, and I'll definitely be adding these Pink Lemonade Cupcakes to my recipe book!

Guiness Chocolate Cupcakes

 In honour of St. Patrick's Day, I decided to make something a little festive this week - namely, Guiness Chocolate Cupcakes. Fair warning, however, that these are probably not suitable for children. If you're familiar with Irish Car Bombs (an alcoholic beverage), you'll understand why. If not, I'll take a second here to explain. An Irish Car Bomb is a shot consisting of Bailey's Irish Cream and Irish Whiskey that is dropped into a glass of Guiness and chugged. From what I've been told, it is smooth and delicious if you drink it fast enough, but can curdle if you take too long. These cupcakes are based on this particular beverage, which doesn't quite sound delicious to me in beverage format, but let me tell you that in dessert it's a fantastic combination.

I was lucky enough to stumble upon this recipe while on Pinterest a few days ago, and you can find the original recipe on a fantastic blog, Brown Eyed Baker, but I'll also be sharing it with you below so that you can experience these delightful cupcakes (I'll be sure to mention the slight variations I used)! The Guiness in the chocolate cupcakes keeps them moist and delicious and provides only the subtlest flavour. The faint hint of Irish Whiskey in the chocolate ganache is a perfect offset to the chocolate, and the Bailey's Butter Cream icing is buttery and smooth and outstanding.  These cupcakes also got rave reviews from those who tried them, so without further adieu:

For the cupcakes, you'll need:
1 cup Guiness Stout (I used Guiness Draught rather than the Stout, as Stout generally has a stronger flavour that I wasn't sure I'd enjoy - and they didn't have any Stout when I shopped for ingredients)
1 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
3/4 cup Dutch-process cocoa powder
2 cups all purpose flour
2 cups granulated sugar
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp salt
2 eggs
2/3 cup sour cream

For the chocolate ganache, you'll need:
8 ounces bittersweet chocolate ( I used half unsweetened chocolate, and half semi-sweet chocolate rather than bittersweet)
2/3 cup heavy cream
2 tbsp butter, room temperature
2 tsp Irish Whiskey

For the Bailey's Butter Cream, you'll need:
2 cups butter, room temperature
5 cups icing sugar
6 tbsp Bailey's Irish Cream

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and line muffin pans with 24 baking cups. Bring the Guiness and butter to a boil in a heavy saucepan over medium heat, and add the cocoa powder. Whisk the mixture until smooth and then allow to cool slightly.

Whisk flour, sugar, baking soda and salt together in a large bowl and then set it aside. In the bowl of a stand mixer, beat the sour cream and eggs until combined. Add the Guiness chocolate mixture to the egg mixture and beat just to combine. Reduce the speed to low and add the flour mixture, beating briefly to combine the ingredients. Using a spatula, fold the batter to ensure everything is combined. Divide the mixture evenly among the baking cups and bake the cupcakes for approximately 18-20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into a cupcake comes out clean.

To make the ganache, finely chop the chocolate and place it in a heat proof bowl. In a saucepan, heat the cream until it comes to a boil and allow it to simmer for about a minute. Remove the cream from the stove and pour over the chocolate. Stir the chocolate and cream until the chocolate has melted and the mixture is smooth. Add in the whiskey and butter and combine well. Let the ganache cool until thick but smooth enough to pipe.

To make the frosting, cream together the butter and icing sugar on medium speed and then add in the Bailey's. Whip until light and fluffy.

Using a cupcake corer, remove the centres of the cupcakes, and fill with chocolate ganache. Follow with the buttercream icing and decorate as desired.

And voila, delicious Irish Car Bomb Cupcakes. Be sure to subscribe to the blog and check out the Facebook and Twitter pages for updates!  Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Maple Chocolate Chip Cupcakes

I don't know about you, but I love this time of year - the sun is shining, the temperature is rising, cupcakes in the oven, and spring is on its way. In my family this means one thing - syrup season. As I have cousins who have a sugar bush, I've grown up knowing that this time of year means fresh,  pure maple syrup. In honour of this marvelous time of year, I decided to make maple cupcakes.

I'd never made (or even tried) maple cupcakes before this experience, so I wasn't sure what to expect. Don't get me wrong, I do love maple syrup but thus far I'd only had it with pancakes, waffles and so on, but never in cake. I found a recipe in The Cupcake Diaries, however, and it seemed fitting for a first attempt. The recipe was for maple chocolate chip cupcakes, which you can find here. It also suggested a chocolate ganache frosting, however I didn't have any heavy cream and opted for the maple cream cheese icing instead.

I knew while they were baking that the cupcakes were going to be good, as there was an incredible scent filling the kitchen as they were nearing the end of their baking time (which I found to be a little longer than the recipe indicated - about 21 minutes rather than 18-20). Wanting to get the full experience of the cupcakes, I tried on before they were iced just to experience the cake on its own. The maple syrup ensured that the cupcakes stayed extremely moist while baking, and provided a delicious flavour.

Next was the icing. It was a basic cream cheese recipe (which you can find here) but had an added 1/4 cup of maple syrup. While it was a nice icing, it was extremely sweet. And when I say extremely, I mean it. It was basically a sugar coma in the making, but tasty nonetheless. And cake is cake, so who am I to complain? I do think I'll make sure to have heavy cream on hand next time though to try them with the ganache frosting instead.

Red Velvet Cupcakes

So far, this has proven to be the best Red Velvet recipe I've used. Ones with less cocoa tend to be a bit more bland (the Cake Boss recipe only calls for 1tbsp of cocoa), so these were perfect. They also stayed nice and moist. I did have to make a special grocery store trip to buy apple cider vinegar though, as it wasn't something we had in the pantry to that point in time. The Cupcake Diaries says this recipe makes 12 cupcakes, but it actually yields about 24.

3 1/4 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp salt
12 tbsp unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 3/4 cups sugar
2 large, room temperature eggs
4 tbsp red food colour (no-taste liquid food colour - no taste is important because it can give off a slightly bitter taste otherwise)
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
2 1/2 tbsp cocoa powder, sifted
1 1/2 cups whole milk, at room temperature
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 tsp apple cider vinegar

Preheat the oven to 350F and line standard cupcakes pans with baking cups or grease pans. Sift together flour and salt and set aside. In stand mixer bowl, cream together the butter and sugar at medium speed until light and fluffy (3-5 minutes). Add the eggs one at a time, mixing slowly after each addition.
In a separate bowl, using a whisk, whisk together the food colour, vanilla, and cocoa powder and then slowly add the mixture to the mixer bowl, mixing slowly until well mixed. Add flour and milk alternately in thirds, scraping the bowl as needed and mixing until incorporated.
In a small bowl, add baking soda to the apple cider vinegar, mix thoroughly (you will see them react to one another) and then add the mixture to the batter and mix only until just incorporated.
Fill each muffin well until it is 2/3 full and then bake for 16-18 minutes (I found that these took closer to 20 minutes, but it will vary with each oven, whether it is convection or not, how full muffin wells are, etc.)

Chocolate Ganache-Filled Red Velvet Cupcakes

Growing up, my sister and I didn't always get along, but now that we've grown up I think you could probably go so far as to even call us friends. So, when she asked if I'd make a cake for her 20th birthday, I was more than happy to oblige (after first having a mid-life crisis because my baby sister is 20, which makes me just plain old).

She requested Red Velvet, which I realize I've already mentioned in a previous post. However, these were not just basic Red Velvet cupcakes. They were filled with chocolate ganache, and were made with a different recipe than the previous cupcakes. If you read my last post, you'll notice that the recipe I used came from Baking With The Cake Boss, and while the cupcakes were definitely red, they were also pretty bland. For these cupcakes, I used a recipe found in Cupcake Diaries (at this point I feel the need to mention that I have still yet to watch Cake Boss, and also that I've never seen DC Cupcakes either - Cupcake Diaries was referred to me). This is the third Red Velvet recipe I've used to date, and it's probably my favourite. You can find it, the chocolate ganache recipe, and the cream cheese recipe on the Recipes page! 

What I instead wanted to talk about was filling cupcakes! I've done this a few times now, and have used two different methods. The first was simply using a Wilton 230 decorating tip to penetrate the cupcake and fill it with the filling of choice. I'm not partial to this method because you cant tell how much you've put into the cupcake, and therefore there is often too little filling as opposed to too much in order to avoid the cupcake breaking. I found that the majority of the filling ended up being absorbed into the cupcake this way because there was so little of it.

Recently, however, I purchased a cupcake corer from Golda's Kitchen. This is what I used when making my sister's cupcakes, and it made filling them a very easy, straightforward process. All you need to do is:

1. Bake cupcakes of choice, as per insturctions
2. Allow cupcakes to cool (you don't want to core them while they're too warm or you'll risk breaking the cupcake)

3. Position corer over centre of cupcake and gently push downward

4. Once corer has been inserted into the cupcake, twist the corer back and forth to cut the inside of the cupcake

5. Remove corer from cupcake, and remove cupcake centre from corer

And voila, cored cupcakes, ready to be filled. If you're using the ganache, like I did, you'll want to make sure it's cooled before filling the cupcakes. Once they're filled as desire, ice your cupcakes and enjoy!

Peanut Butter Cupcakes and Butter Cream Roses

I'm going to be completely honest about a couple things:
1. I love peanut butter
2. I have no self-control when it comes to baked goods

Only the first point is relevant to this post, but the second is important because I just feel better admitting it. Its like a weight is lifted.

Moving along, what I wanted to talk about today was not only my absolute favourite cupcakes, but also butter cream roses.

I stumbled on a great video on YouTube, sort of by accident, and it was a pretty clear tutorial about how to pipe butter cream roses, something which, until this point, I hadn't even fathomed trying. The video made it look pretty easy though, and I decided I wanted to learn. This required cupcakes, because who needs icing roses with no cupcake? No one.

This brings me to the peanut butter cupcakes. My absolute favourite cupcakes. Without a doubt the best things of my life. So I thought I'd share the recipe with you, which I originally found on the Wilton website. To make the cupcakes, you'll need:

2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 1/4 cups firmly packed brown sugar
6 tbsp butter, softened
3/4 cup peanut butter
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract (the original recipe calls for clear vanilla, but I prefer pure vanilla extract, it has a nicer flavour)
1 cup milk

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees, and either line a muffin pan with cups or spray it with non-stick baking spray and set it aside. In a medium bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, and salt, and set it aside once they're combined. In a large bowl, cream the butter, brown sugar, and peanut butter. Once the mixture is smooth, add the eggs one at a time, followed by the vanilla extract. Next, alternately add the milk and the flour mixture until all of the ingredients are combined. Spoon the batter into the muffin cups, and bake for 20-25 minutes, checking that they're done (use a cake tester or a tooth pick, if it comes out clean they're ready!).

Once my cupcakes were ready, I used my new-found rose-making savvy to pipe butter cream roses. I used a chocolate butter cream icing because there is something irresistible about peanut butter and chocolate. Some of the roses were piped onto parchment paper squares on a flower nail, while I piped others directly onto the cupcakes. While they were by no means perfect, they turned out pretty well for a first attempt. Check out the video below and attempt these cupcakes and flowers yourself!