Europeans Don't Like Cupcakes

So before I left on my (awesome) European vacation I decided it would be really awesome if i had cupcakes in every country that i went to. 

One small problem with my plan.  EUROPEANS DON'T LOVE CUPCAKES LIKE I DO.  :(   I only found them in one place -- London.  And that was by sheer coincidence.  So instead of a post full of cupcakes, you will get a post full of European pastries and sweets that i shoved down my throat.  And oh man, did i eat a lot of everything.   

London, England

The first (and eventually last) stop on our journey was in London.  We went shopping (and by that i mean window shopping because the dollar is crap) at Oxford Circle and i saw this adorable little stand when we wandered into Top Shop.  So we bought three mini ones and ate them that night with some cider, haha.  They were yummies.  And this is the point in the trip where i got all excited and thought that id be eating lots and lots of cuppycakes. 

Amsterdam, Netherlands
This is the point in the trip that i realized there would not be lots and lots of cupcakes.  They arent big on cupcakes, they are big on waffles.  Seriously.

I googled cupcakes shops and found two.  One we went to was not a cupcake shop.  The second we never found and I made us waste time.  -.-   So that's when i decided to just eat any pastry i could find instead lol.

They actually have a ton of shops like this; half pastry half ... pizza?  Strange i know.  But walking around we tons dozens of shops like these.  They were adorable.  I tried some special waffle cookie but was not impressed.  Don't tell them that though.

St. Goar, Germany
Since Amsterdam crushed my dreams, as soon as we got into Germany I bought this muffin in a cup.  LOL. muffin cake?  It wasn't very good.   Nor was the desert we had at dinner...  This was actually the theme of my time in Germany, to be frank =x.

Munich, Germany
There were no sweets here.  :(  Just salt.  Lots of meat and salt.  The closest thing that i had was a giant pretzel as big as my head.  No joke.

Hopfgarten, Austria 
No sweets there.  :(

Venice, Italy
I love, love, love this city.  It's gorgeous. It was my first taste of Italy.  And their espresso, and their gellato... and of course the pastries.

Rome, Italy
I don't even know what this was.  It was superrrrr light and delicious.  It was almost like cheese cake but not.  I wanted to find the cook and ask him what the recipe for their sauce was though, cuz it was amazing.

But this was the hands down best gelato that i had in Italy.  They put whipped cream in the middle.  >.<  To die for.

Florence, Italy
Napolean ice cream cake!  Full disclosure:  So drunk that i don't even remember if this was good or not.  Good old wine....  This gelato was just all right.  Tiramisu.  Should have stuck with something more sweet!

Lucerne, Switzerland

I had some kind of nutty cinnamon roll in Switzerland.  They called it Schnecke.  Switzerland felt a bit like Ikea though.  I am not sure why.  

Paris, France
My oh my.  I can say that you have lot lived until you have had a chocolate croissant (pan au chocolate) until you have had one in France.  I will pay 2k just to fly back one day and eat them 24/7.

I didn't get to eat a crepe, which made me sad.  But i had macaroons.  And bread. We bought a baguette and made fools of ourselves. Don't judge.

Writing this post has made me sad.  I want to go back and eat all the things again!

xoxo,
Anna

P.S.  I might have gained like 8 lbs on this trip. LOL.  Now you know why.

Strawberry (Cream) Cheese Cake Cupcakes

So the minute I saw this blogger's post for these strawberry cheese cake inspired cuppycakes, i knew i would have to bake them for sure.  (As did half of the internet.)  Because they just looked ridiculously delicious.  So i saved the page and waited for a good time.  Obviously a good time meant the first time i used my handy dandy stand mixer.

They're all over the internet, and i can see why.  So pretty!  Taste wise, i'd bake them again but they aren't my favorites.  I prefer my own strawberry-strawberry cupcakes, but they are still SUPER yummy.  I love strawberries!  So sad to see the season ending though.

I get so excited when im about to start baking and i lay everything out, and then measure out ingredients.  I guess everyone has their secret nerdiness.  At least my nerdiness fills tummies?  I only wish that i had a nifty 1k camera that would magically take awesome pictures for me too.  Maybe one day.

Graham Cracker Crust
(preheat oven to 350)
1.5 packets of graham crackers, crumbled
1.5 sticks of non salted butter

Crush up the graham crackers (rolling pin in a ziplock)!  Add melted butter (minute and half in the microwave) and squish between your (super clean) hands.

Line 2 muffin pans with liners.  I chose red today.  And i say chose because this is what i look at each day i bake.  I love pretty liners  <3

 

One tablespoon of the mixture goes into each cupcake liner.  Smush down.

Put into oven around 4 minutes, or until the grahams start turning brown.  Remove and set aside.


Vanilla Cake with Strawberries
Makes 24, exactly

1 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1,5 sticks of unsalted butter, room temp
1 cup + 2 Tbs sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup vanilla yogurt
4 large eggs, room temp
2 cups fresh strawberries, hulled & coarsely chopped (approx one 16 oz container, minus 6 medium/small strawberries used later for topping).

 In one small bowl, whisk together the baking powder, flour and salt.  Set aside.

In a larger bowl, crack open your eggs and separate the egg whites.  This is what you want.  This is actually the first time i tried doing this.  I was bad. hahaha.  Next time ill just buy egg whites in a carton.  Less messy.

Beat the eggwhites for about 4 minutes.  You will see them go from liquid, to bubbly, to thick foam.  Once they have "glossy peaks" you stop beating.  Im still working on this.  But it's amazing how quickly eggs can change their property!

Next, in a large bowl cream together butter and sugar.  This was when the stand mixer came out!!!  Awesome.  Beat until fluffy.

Add vanilla.  Add 1/2 the flour, then 1/2 the yogurt, then the remaining flour and remaining yogurt.  Beat on low in between these additions.  The mixture looks a little dry, but don't worry that will change.

Stop the mixer and manually fold in the egg whites.  Don't mix, fold in.  Lastly, fold in the 2 cups of strawberries.

 The batter looks gorgeous.  Gorgeous gorgeous!  It looks like some yummy yogurt parfait or something.   Scoop over the graham cracker crust.  (I used one ice cream scoop.)

Throw them in the oven for about 15-20 minutes.  Keep an eye on them!  Remove when done.

Stare at them and have a difficult battle with yourself as you tell yourself you cannot shove them in your mouth, they just came out of the oven and they need to cool.

Cream Cheese Frosting

1.5 package (12 oz) cream cheese

1 stick unsalted butter at room temp

2.5 cups powdered sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

Cream together butter and cream cheese.  Add vanilla.  Slowly add powdered sugar.

Once the cupcakes are cooled, frost the tops with the cream cheese.

Topping
1/2  a graham cracker, crumbled  (one will be enough for all 24)
6 strawberries, cut into fours

Now take your frosted cupcake...

Add a sprinkle of graham cracker "dust"...

And a strawberry slice to finish it off.

Now give it lots of friends.

As a bonus, these cupcakes are pretty on the outside AND the inside.  They're the Miss America of Cupcakes, i think.  Layers of graham crackers, strawberries and frosting.  Nom.

This one is cut in half to show off that pretty but let's be real.  No one eats just half of one, right?

I brought these to my gym this morning. Haha.  Yes my gym.  My boxing instructor ate 3.5 during my one hour work out.  And got on one knee.  Just saying.  All in all, a job well done my friends.  Made yummy cupcakes and i finally got to break in that new mixer!!!

xoxo,
Anna

P.S. OH, also, while putting groceries away this weekend I found a container of cajeta in the fridge.  I think it was a secret calling that I need to get on those tres leches cupcakes  (or ANY cupcakes) and somehow incorporate cajeta in it as well.  Cajeta is a delicious, thick Mexican caramel.  Gotta use it on something!  Hopefully I can get those out for my mom's birthday before i leave on vacation. Stay tuned!  update// finally made them 4 months later:  Cajeta Tres Leches Cupcakes.

Baking is Expensive

It is.  The flour.  The sugar.  The eggs.  The 2011Kitchenaid 10 year anniversary Susan G. Komen stand mixer from Williams-Sonoma...

It looks so pretty and perfect in the kitchen! No i have not used it yet but it has only been four days!  And the possibilities are endless.  >.<

This is like Christmas for me.  Except better because i don't end up with anything awkward.  I end up with exactly what i wanted.  (And for fifty bucks less because of a price mistake!)

At the latest I will have to bake for my mom's birthday in the beginning of October.  And i hope it's the strawberry cheesecake cupcakes i have been dying to make. Can't wait!!!

xoxo,
Anna

S'mores Cupcakes

Oh my. The S'mores cupcakes made a reappearance this year. Better than ever I would say, in fact. (Old post.)

Three yummy ingredients; Ghirardelli chocolate, marshmallow (cream) and cinnamon graham crackers. One result; delicioussssss.

I ate like 7 of these over the course of three days. Don't judge me. It was vacation. Calories don't count, ha.

Get ready for a super picture heavy post! I had help taking pictures this time by the birthday girl herself. Her pictures are the ones that aren't crappy.) You can find her blog on fashion, art and photography here. She requested these specifically. And because she made the banner for this site, she gets what she wants. (Plus snickerdoodle cupcakes and cookies.) Last year she got the Catch A Husband Strawberry Cupcakes in b&w zebra liners. So this year, i decided to run with the theme.

I had pink zebra liners i had yet to use, as well as these awesome zebra candles i picked up in a shop in Philly last year. Then i added in some plain pink candles too. (DON'T COUNT HOW MANY THERE ARE. SHE WILL GET MAD.) All together on the cupcakes stand, they looked pretty gosh darn awesome. But more on that later.

The recipe for this is basically in three parts. And it varies a little from what i did last year. This year I did something different with the graham crackers, and the batter was from scratch.

Graham Cracker Crust/Topping

1.5 packages of Cinnamon Graham Crackers

3/4 sticks of butter

1. Place all crackers into a ziplock bag and crush them into pieces with a rolling pin.

2. Separate out 1/4 cups of broken graham crackers, put the rest in a bowl.

3. Melt 3/4 of a stick of butter in the microwave and pour over the graham crackers pieces in bowl.

4. Mush them together with your clean hands.

Now comes the fun part.

1. Scoop 1 tablespoon of the mixture into lined cupcake pans. (Or scoop 1 teaspoon into mini cupcakes pans.)

2. Flatten out with your hands.

3. Put in preheated, 350* oven for 5 minutes and remove, set aside to cool.

Chocolate Chip Cupcakes

(Makes 24 standard cupcakes, but if using this for smores it will make 24 standard plus 24 mini cupcakes)

Go here for my go-to chocolate cupcake recipe. Use Ghirardelli coco powder though b/c thats the only thing i'll use now. :)

Add 1 cup chocolate chips. Yum.

Now, take your batter and pour it OVER the baked graham cracker crust. I did the usual amount b/c i wanted mine to be big monster cupcakes.

Oh what is this though?

That's right, i sprinkled about 1 teaspoon of the remaining graham cracker crumbs over the top of the unbaked batter. And THEN you put it in the oven.

When they come out they look like this. You can just eat it on its own, huh?

But just wait my dears. Cuz i did. I had to wait until the next day, in fact. They were transported to another place (beach house, holla') and were frosting'ed up there.

photo credit: pandippo

Marshmallow Frosting

1 jar Jiff Marshmallow Frosting (7 oz)

1 stick unsalted butter at room temp

2 cups powdered sugar

1. Yes the whole can of the stuff. And you will like it. Put it into a big bowl and add the butter. Beat together.

photo credit: pandippo

2. Add sugar, beat until light and fluffy.

photo credit: pandippo

photo credit: pandippo

photo credit: pandippo

Use a 1M tip to frost the cupcakes until they look like this:

photo credit: pandippo

Awesome huh.

I also used the 1M tip to frost the little mini cupcakes with just a dollop of frosting. The 1M tip is also called a star tip and with good reason. A dollop looks like a star :)

photo credit: pandippo

photo credit: pandippo

And then you eat them. All. No I'm kidding. Then you make them even prettier. Add the snickerdoodle cupcakes and a stand.

Then add the candles. Now the hard part.

Lighting them REALLY fast.

photo credit: pandippo

It becomes a group effort!

photo credit: pandippo

Looks awesome lit though! :)

I hope to God she didn't wish for more cupcakes.

Melty zebra-ness.

Pretty Birthday girl about to eat her cuppycake.

photo credit: pandippo

Okay, NOW you can eat them. All.

photo credit: pandippo

xoxo,

Anna