Fresh Strawberry Muffins with Cinnamon Oatmeal Walnut Almond Streusel

I feel guilty, opening up this text box and starting a new blog like I haven't been MIA for almost two months.  Life blew up.  Sorry?  It doesn't mean I wasn't baking this whole time.  If you follow me on IG you know I'm in the kitchen almost every weekend.  I just didn't have time to blog about it all.  Work, Life, Sunshine... all that got in the way of me blogging.  Life has finally calmed down now, so I am able to play catch up. Starting with these muffins I made for my mom for Mother's Day... back in May.

I've mentioned before that I hate giving my mom any of my baking because she dislikes sweets and always says the same thing;  "Too much sugar!".  Drives me crazy.  So she got something without any frosting or icing or chocolate.  She got something full of strawberries.

Strawberries make me think of my childhood.  Although I am not from Watsonville, growing up we had family there so I learned to walk in the strawberry fields.  And one of my oldest memories is eating strawberries in the backyard after a summer rain, staring at the resulting rainbow.  Yes, I'm serious that is an actual memory.  I also had a puppy but she must have been elsewhere that day.  In any case, it felt appropriate to make these for my mom. 

Fresh Strawberry Muffins
Makes 15, Bake at 350* for 18 minutes

2 cups+ 2 tbls flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
2/3 cup sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
2 eggs
1/4 cup oil
2 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup greek yogurt
1 cup diced, floured, fresh strawberries

Directions:
1. In one bowl, mix dry ingredients together and set aside.
2. In stand mixer bowl, add wet ingredients and stir until well combined.
3. Add flour mixture to wet mixture, 1/2 c at a time and mix on low until well incorporated.
4. Pour batter into lined muffin tins.

Cinnamon Oatmeal Walnut Almond Streusel:
2 tablespoons slivered almonds
1/3 cup walnuts
1/4 cup oats
1/4 cup flour
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 tsp Cinnamon
3 tablespoons melted butter

Directions
1. Mix together nuts, oats, flour, sugar and cinnamon.
2. Melt butter and pour over mixture. Knead together.  Mixture should be clumpy.
3. Measure out 1 tablespoon of streusel and sprinkle directly on top of batter in muffins tins.
4. Bake in oven for about 18 minutes.

I'm saving this recipe here and in my brain.  I love this streussel topping on most anything but on top of muffins filled with fresh berries?  Yum.   Eat these warm, right out of the oven or warm them in the toaster oven first.  You will be glad you did.

I promise I will be back sooner than 2 months from now.  :)

xoxo,
Anna

Walnut Pumpkin Spice Cupcakes

Happy Thanksgiving week everyone!

The holidays are well under way and I've already gained my obligatory five pounds of winter squish.  A little early this year because I just came back from a 7 day cruise to Mexico where I ate my face off, yes, but also because I just had my first of at least four Thanksgivings.

Yes you read that correctly.  I am having at least four Thanksgivings this year.  And of course I will be baking for all.

The first thing I've baked so far are these very autumn themed Walnut Pumpkin Spice Cupcakes.  After two or so years, I think I have finally perfected my pumpkin spice recipe.  I'm very excited about that.  I'll be adding nuts each time I make it now though, that's for sure. But I am also very happy with the aesthetic of how they came out.  (That means I think they're prettyyyyyy.)

At first I was not even excited about making these.  Until I made a basic pumpkin spice cupcake my own, of course.  Add walnuts.  Add a ginger molasses cookie crust.  And more walnuts on top.  Done.

But I also wanted them to LOOK like fall.  I had done leaves before and I loved how they had come out but they needed something more.  And then I remembered the teeny tiny little leaf shaped cookie cutter that I had bought almost a year ago in a set of cookie cutters at Sur La Table.  I bought it for the star to use on my red velvet cupcakes, but the pack contained a leaf too.  I searched about the grocery store until I found some type of candy I could roll out and settled on gum drops because of the added sugar sprinkle flare. They're quite easy to roll out once you get the hang of it.  But until you get the hang of it, it's a sticky mess so beware.

Gum Drop Leaves
Large Pack of Large Gum Drops/Spice Drops
Small Leaf Cutter

Directions:
1. With a rolling pin and medium pressure, roll on top of gum drop. Turn gum drop 90* and roll again.  Flip gum drop over and repeat until gum drop is mostly flat, about an 1/4 inch long.
2. Press cutter over gum drop and remove excess gum drop from sides before pushing out the leaf.
Tips:  The reason you are are slowly rolling out the gum drop is because if you apply too much pressure and roll it out flat at once, you will make a sticky mess.  You want the gum drop to retain the sugar on top so that it not only looks pretty, but also so that you can still work with it.  Once it's too thin you won't be able to use it anymore.


Initially I wanted to use ginger snaps.  Unfortunately I couldn't find them at the two stores I went to and it was pouring rain so I ended my search and bought molasses cookies.  I spiked them heavily with ginger instead.


Ginger Molasses Crust  (optional)
1 package (10 medium-large) of molasses cookies
2 tsp ginger
1/8 c butter, melted


1. Crush cookies with rolling pin and place in bowl.
2. Add melted butter to cookies, add just enough to make the crumbs workable.
3. Add ginger. Spice to taste.
4. Place one tablespoon of crumbs at the bottom of a lined cupcake tin and press down.
5. Bake in oven for 3-4 minutes at 350* and set aside to cool.



Pumpkin Spice Cupcakes
Makes 15, Bake for 350* for approx. 15 minutes

1 1/8 cups flour
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp ginger
1/4 tsp cloves
1/4 tsp all spice
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tbls baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 c. white sugar
1/2 c. brown sugar
1/4 c. oil
1 egg
1 c. pumpkin
1/3 c. sour cream
1/3 c. roasted walnuts

Directions:
1. In a medium bowl, sift together flour, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, cloves, all spice, salt, baking powder and baking soda.
2.  In the bowl of your stand mixer, stir two sugars, egg, oil, pumpkin and sour cream until combined.
3.  Slowly add in your dry ingredient mixture to the wet mixture, beat on medium speed.
4. Fold in roasted walnuts.
5. Scoop batter onto the top of the ginger molasses crust and bake in oven for 15 minutes or until done.

Cream Cheese Frosting
1 8-oz package cream cheese
1/2 cup unsalted butter
2 teaspoons vanilla
3 cups powdered sugar

Directions:
1. Cream butter and cream cheese in stand mixer until smooth.
2. Add in vanilla.
3. Add powdered sugar, one cup at a time and beat until fluffy.
4. Frost cupcakes.

I can't say how much the walnuts added to these cupcakes.  Really.

That and the fact that they bake up super fluffy and full of moisture.

Actually I think it's the combination of the spice and the walnuts and the ginger crust that makes these so good. When people first bite into the crust, they know it's good but they aren't even sure what it is except that they like it.

It's all the flavors of fall (dressed up with a bow of course) in your mouth all at the SAME time. Awesome.

Let's see what else I end up making this week.  Hopefully you fill your kitchens and your bellies with something wonderful.

xoxo,
Anna

Carrot Cupcakes with Pineapple Cream Cheese Frosting

... and the most adorable candy melt carrot toppers ever!

This is another one of those Anna is crazy pants things.  I baked for no reason at all.  There are 14 cupcakes sitting on my counter right now.  Luckily I can think of a few takers, but there's always the chance that I will end up with a pile of liners in front of me and a face full of crumbs.

In case you're looking for a last minute Easter treat to whip up before tomorrow you should try these.  So easy!  You probably already have most of these things in your pantry already.  I did.

Why did I bake these?  Well, it's because I discovered that I do, in fact, like carrot cake.  Wait no, I LOVE carrot cake.  Where had it been all my life!  It's only be in the last year or so that I realized this, so any time I have gotten the chance to shove these down my throat, I have.

I'm actually a crazy picky eater.  Ridiculous.  My food habits get annoying, I know, my poor friends.  At least for savory foods.  But for the sweet?  Man, I love sweets... So I don't know why I had always avoided carrot cake.  Maybe the thought of carrots? But what a huge mistake that was.

(Funny story, I went to the "Exploratorium After Dark" in San Francisco last week with some friends and the theme was food.  A bunch of different exhibits like making ice cream with dry ice and cricket chip cookies.  In one exhibit you drank some liquid that would dull your ability to sense sweet.  I refused to try this because I do NOT want to mess with my taste buds.  What if I could never taste sweet again???  The horror.)

Anyways, the cupcake recipe I adapted from here.  Something else I found on pinterest!  It's becoming so handy.

I got up at 6:55AM to start grating carrots for these.  Worth it!

The left over carrots I ate while I cooked.  I felt like Bugs Bunny.

Carrot Cupcakes
Makes 12-15, Bake at 350* for about 15 minutes

1 c flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tspsalt
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 tsp ground ginger
1/2 c granulated sugar
1/2 c packed light brown sugar
1/2 c canola oil
4 round pineapple slices
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 eggs, room temp
1 1/2 cups grated carrots (3 large ones)
1/2 cups walnuts  (1/4 c for batter, 1/4 c for garnish)

Directions:
1. If using walnuts, lightly roast them on a baking tray for about 4-5 minutes. Cool, then process them finely.  I just chopped mine up small with a knife though.
2. Puree pineapple slices along with a bit of juice in a blender.
3. Whisk flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg and ground ginger in bowl & set aside.
 until smooth and set aside.
4. In a large bowl, whisk sugars, pineapple puree and oil until blended. Add in eggs, one at at time and whisk. Add in the flour mixture and stir until blended.
5. Stir in the vanilla, carrots and walnuts.
6. Scoop batter into cupcake liners and bake awesomeness.

These end up baking up really nicely.  This has been the first time that I have used oil instead of butter.  It scared me a little at first, but in the end it worked out fine.  Also note that you don't even need a mixer for this!  You stir by hand.  Kind of awesome.   The end result is one of those cupcakes that you can visually see that there are 568 ingredients in it.  I love that.

Pineapple Cream Cheese Frosting
1 8 oz package cream cheese
1/2 a stick of non salted butter
3 tablespoons pineapple juice
2 cups powdered sugar

Directions:
1. Cream butter and cream cheese until soft in a mixer.
2. Add pineapple juice.
3. Slowly add in sugar.
4. Refrigerate for ten minutes if too soft, then frost cupcakes.

Now it's time to work on the toppings.

Toppings
1/4 cup walnuts
Around 15 green candy melts
Around 30 orange candy melts

Easy peasy walnut sprinkling... I tried to make mine look like dirt on top!

Then, I made carrots out of orange and green candy melts that were used to stick on top of the cupcakes.  Like they were growing out of the cupcake and dirt. I just melted the chips in microwaveable proof bowls and then scooped it into zip log bags to pipe onto wax paper. I had a stencil I hand drew to help me along.

I ended up doing two sizes of the carrots, to see which were better.  In the end I liked them both and used both.

I mean after all in real carrot patches aren't the carrots in all sizes?  And my kitchen/my front yard is totally like the real thing...  Or at least I temporarily turned it into the real thing.  :)

You can kind of see the difference in sizes in this picture below.  Cute huh?

A few months ago, I was at the Daiso Japan store  (Japanese $1.50 store that sells All The Things you don't need but really so want) by my work and I found this cute little stand for a pot.  I thought it'd look awesome as a cupcake holder.  I was right.

And don't worry these are just as yummy as you would hope they would be.

Happy Easter!

xoxo,
Anna

During Christmas My Feelings Taste Like Cookies

Well to be exact - my friends are the ones who are really tasting the cookies/feelings since i bake to give away.

I made five kinds of cookies last week.

1. Chocolate Chocolate Chip


2. Chocolate Chip Walnut


3. Sugar Cookies


4. Peanut Butter


5. Chocolate Chip Mint ( recipe #2 minus the walnuts, add 6 drops of green food coloring and mint chips)
I think my favorite were the chocolate chip walunts and the chocolate chocolate chip. Unluckily/luckily - depending on how you look at it - i didn't keep too many for myself. Maybe next year i will. Most of them got packed up in tupper wear or zip locks bags and distributed about the Bay, Philly and Wisconsin.



If you're wondering, I ended up making over 140 cookies. o.O Yeah i know. That's a lot of cookies!


I spent almost an entire day baking. Around hour three of preparing the dough, i came to the realization that the next boy in my life will have to find a girl wearing cheetah pajamas and a cupcake apron dirtied with sugar and chocolate extremely sexy. Cuz that's how I roll way too often. Feel free to pimp me out if you know of any boy (with abs) who has expressed this fetish. Thanks.

xoxo,
Anna