I just can’t win when it comes to this blog! I’m awful at updating. I love taking the pictures, editing them, and getting them just right, but I hate actually writing up these entries. That was always my problem with making websites. I could spend hours on the web design, but dreaded actually making content. Anyway, I actually completed this challenge at the very beginning the month. I was so proud of myself! For once I would write up my post early and wait for it to automatically post on the magic Daring Baker’s posting day. For once I would be ahead and not scrambling to get this entry done near midnight the night before. However, April also happened to the month of final exams so my early procrastination only left me the last two weeks of April, which were completely dedicated to studying till I died. Of course the need to relax for a bit and finally a summer job got in a the way and well… you know the rest!

The April 2009 challenge was hosted by Jenny from Jenny Bakes. She has chosen Abbey’s Infamous Cheesecake as the challenge.

I was relieved the moment I saw April’s Daring Baker’s Challenge. I love the great and beautiful people at DB, but sometimes they choose recipes that are complicated and include so many ingredients that I just can’t afford to participate. April’s choice was perfect! A cheesecake! How simple, right? We were given a basic recipe and allowed to get as creative as we wanted with it. Not only was it cheap because I all I had to buy was cream cheese and then use whatever I had on hand, but it also granted everyone so much freedom to make a billion types of variations.

I made two cheesecakes for this challenge (I actually had planned on another, but never had time for it)! One was a Bailey’s Irish Cream cheesecake with a dulce de leche swirl and devil’s food cake base and the other was Tiramisu because I’m obsessed with that amazing dessert.

Abbey’s Infamous Cheesecake

Crust:
2 cups / 180 g graham cracker crumbs
1 stick / 4 oz butter, melted
2 tbsp. / 24 g sugar
1 tsp. vanilla extract

Cheesecake:
3 sticks of cream cheese, 8 oz each (total of 24 oz) room temperature
1 cup / 210 g sugar
3 large eggs
1 cup / 8 oz heavy cream
1 tbsp. lemon juice
1 tbsp. vanilla extract (or the innards of a vanilla bean)
1 tbsp liqueur, optional, but choose what will work well with your cheesecake

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (Gas Mark 4 = 180C = Moderate heat). Begin to boil a large pot of water for the water bath.
2. Mix together the crust ingredients and press into your preferred pan. You can press the crust just into the bottom, or up the sides of the pan too – baker’s choice. Set crust aside.
3. Combine cream cheese and sugar in the bowl of a stand-mixer (or in a large bowl if using a hand-mixer) and cream together until smooth. Add eggs, one at a time, fully incorporating each before adding the next. Make sure to scrape down the bowl in between each egg. Add heavy cream, vanilla, lemon juice, and alcohol and blend until smooth and creamy.
4. Pour batter into prepared crust and tap the pan on the counter a few times to bring all air bubbles to the surface. Place pan into a larger pan and pour boiling water into the larger pan until halfway up the side of the cheesecake pan. If cheesecake pan is not airtight, cover bottom securely with foil before adding water.
5. Bake 45 to 55 minutes, until it is almost done – this can be hard to judge, but you’re looking for the cake to hold together, but still have a lot of jiggle to it in the center. You don’t want it to be completely firm at this stage. Close the oven door, turn the heat off, and let rest in the cooling oven for one hour. This lets the cake finish cooking and cool down gently enough so that it won’t crack on the top. After one hour, remove cheesecake from oven and lift carefully out of water bath. Let it finish cooling on the counter, and then cover and put in the fridge to chill. Once fully chilled, it is ready to serve.

Pan note: The creator of this recipe used to use a springform pan, but no matter how well she wrapped the thing in tin foil, water would always seep in and make the crust soggy. Now she uses one of those 1-use foil “casserole” shaped pans from the grocery store. They’re 8 or 9 inches wide and really deep, and best of all, water-tight. When it comes time to serve, just cut the foil away. I actually used a normal 6 inch cake pan, but buttered the sides of the pan and then lined it with parchment paper. I wanted to make small cheesecakes, but didn’t want to waste money on a new springform pan. Luckily this trick worked perfectly and the cheesecake came out easily!

Prep notes: While the actual making of this cheesecake is a minimal time commitment, it does need to bake for almost an hour, cool in the oven for an hour, and chill overnight before it is served. Please plan accordingly!

Bailey's Irish Cream cheesecake with dulce de leche swirl

Bailey’s Irish Cream Cheesecake

Components:

• Devil’s food cake crust
• Bailey’s Irish Cream cheesecake
• Dulce de Leche swirl
• Optional whip cream for decoration

The Steps I Took:
Assembling this cake is fairly easy and all needed recipes have been provided below.

1. Make the devil’s food cake with the recipe provided below. Follow the baking directions exactly and set aside while it cools. I actually think I made the cakes the night before.
2. To make the dulce de leche, instead of doing that silly can boiling method, I instead poured all of the unsweetened condensed milk into a saucepan and allowed it to cook at around medium to medium-high heat for at least an hour. This way is much faster, safer, and easier do because you can actually see how dark and thick it’s become over time.
3. In order to make the cheesecake I simply followed the provided cheesecake recipe (skipping the crust of course), excluded the lemon juice, and added about 2 tbsp of Bailey’s Irish Cream. You can decide how much you want to use. I merely did it based on how it tasted.
4. Now that you have your cheesecake items ready, pour the cheesecake mixture into your pan, then spoon some of dulce de leche on top and use a knife to cut through it and make a marbled effect.
5. Bake the cheesecake as directed, then let it cool on a wire rack. Once at room temperature you can begin to assemble everything! Take your devil’s food cake base (you can cut it down a bit if it looks too big) and cover it with a layer of dulce de leche. Place the cheesecake on top, then slather another layer of ducle de leche on top of that.
6. For the finishing touches I took my other small devil’s food cake, made crumbs, and sprinkled them on top of the dulce de leche, being careful to push them down a bit at the end in order to make sure they stuck. I had already placed my remaining dulce de leche in a squeeze bottle (much like those red and yellow ketchup and mustard ones you get at restaurants) and striped the top with dulce de leche.
7. I felt that it looked a little plain still and whipped up some whip cream with 1 cup heavy cream, 1/4 cup sugar, and a bit of vanilla extract. You can add some gelatin if you want to make a more stabliized whip cream, but I don’t have a recipe for that. You can look that up!
8. Once fully put together, I put the cheesecake in the fridge to completely chill. Serve as you like.

Devil’s Food Cake

Recipe from the Devil’s Food White-Out Cake in Baking: From My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan.

• 1-1/3 cup all purpose flour
• 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 3/4 cup teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1-1/4 sticks (10 tbs) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1/2 cup light brown sugar
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 3 large eggs, room temperature
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 oz bittersweet chocolate, melted and cooled
• 1/2 cup buttermilk or whole milk, room temperature
• 1/2 cup boiling water
• 4 oz semisweet or milk chocolate, finely chopped or 2/3 cup mini chocolate chips

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Butter two 8×2 round cake pans (I used two 6×3 inch cake pans) .
2. Sift together flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder and salt.
3. Working with a stand mixer, preferably fitted with a paddle attachment, or with a hand mixer in a large bowl, beat the butter on medium speed until soft and creamy.
4. Add the sugars and continue to beat for another 3 minutes. Add the eggs one by one, beating for 1 minute after each addition. Beat in the vanilla. Don’t be concerned if it looks curdled!
5. Reduce the mixer speed to low and mix in melted chocolate. When it is fully incorporated, add the dry ingredients alternately with the buttermilk, adding the dry in 3 additions and the milk in 2 (begin and end with the dry ingredients). Scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed and mix only until the ingredients disappear into the batter.
6. At this point, the batter will be thick, like frosting. Still working on a low speed, mix in the boiling water, which will thin the batter considerably.
7. Switch to a rubber spatula, scrape down the bowl, and stir in chopped chocolate.
8. Divide the batter evenly between the two pans and smooth the tops with the rubber spatula.
9. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes, rotating pans at the midway point. When fully baked they will be springy to the touch and a thin knife inserted into the center will come out clean. Don’t worry if tops have small cracks.
10. Transfer to a rack to cool for about 5 minutes, then take it out of the pan and let cool to room temperature.

The remaining slice of the Bailey's cheesecake. Notice the bottom layer of dulce de leche oozing out!

Tiramisu Cheesecake

Components:

• Chocolate Teddy Graham crust
• Kahlua Cheesecake
• Lady Fingers
• Espresso syrup to dip the ladyfingers in
• Cocoa powder
• Tiramisu Cream
• Optional whip cream for decoration

The Steps I Took:
I wnated this cheesecake to resemble tiramisu so the steps are very similar to that. All needed recipes have been provided below.

1. To make the Teddy Graham crust use the crust recipe provided, but substitute chocolate Teddy Grahams for the graham crackers.
2. Follow the cheesecake recipe and set the cheesecake mixture aside. You’re going to put all of the components together before baking.
3. If you haven’t done it already, line the pan you want to use with the crust and bake as directed.
4. Once done dip each side of the ladyfingers in espresso syrup and arrange in a single layer on top the crust. Break up pieces as needed to make it fit.
5. Pour half of the cheesecake mixture on top of the ladyfingers, then dust with a layer of cocoa powder.
6. Repeat the process by making another layer of  dipped lady fingers, cheesecake, and cocoa powder.
7. Bake as directed, then set on wire rack to cool. Once at room temperature remove from pan and chill.
8. If desired, decorate with whip cream and sprinkle cocoa powder on top. Enjoy!

Inside view of the tiramisu cheesecake to show off the layering.

Both recipes came from the Cook’s Illustrated Tiramisu recipe.

Espresso Syrup

• 1 cup brewed espresso, room temperature
• 2 tablespoons dark rum

Tiramisu Cream

• 3 large egg yolks
• 1/3 cup sugar
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 pound mascarpone (I used cream cheese)
• 3/8 cup heavy cream
• 2 tablespoons dark rum

I halfed this recipe, That’s why it ended up with 3/8 cup heavy cream. Double it if you want the regular amount.

1. For the espresso syrup: combine both ingredients and set aside.
2. For the Tiramisu Cream: In bowl of standing mixer fitted with whisk attachment, beat yolks at low speed until just combined.
3. Add sugar and salt and beat at medium-high speed until pale yellow, 1-1/2 to 2 minutes, scraping down bowl with rubber spatula once or twice.
4. Add 2 tablespoons rum and beat at medium speed until just combined, 20 to 30 seconds; scrape bowl.
5. Add mascarpone and beat at medium speed until no lumps remain, 30 to 45 seconds, scraping down bowl once or twice. Transfer mixture to large bowl and set aside.
6. In now-empty mixer bowl (no need to clean bowl), beat cream at medium speed until frothy, 1 to 1-1/2 minutes.
7. Increase speed to high and continue to beat until cream holds stiff peaks, 1 to 1 1/2 minutes longer. Using rubber spatula, fold one-third of whipped cream into mascarpone mixture to lighten, then gently fold in remaining whipped cream until no white streaks remain. Set mascarpone mixture aside.

Tiramisu slice. Notice the custard like Tiramisu cream on top!

Sadly, I didn't realize my memory card wasn't in my camera when I took photos of the Bailey's cheesecake. When I finally realized only this small piece was left.

About a month ago I bought Baking From My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan (amazing book!) because of the Tuesdays with Dorie posts that constantly fill the blogosphere every week. It wasn’t until recently (mostly because they won’t be accepting anymore members after this month) that I actually decided to join TwD for myself!

For this week, Kelly of Sounding My Barbaric Gulp chose to make pumpkin muffins (you can find the recipe here), which was definitely a great choice for the fall! I’ve been dying to make something pumpkin ever since the leaves started changing colors and because of this recipe I’ve probably made more than enough pumpkin foods to last me for a while.

You see, Saturday night I remembered that we didn’t have any pumpkin puree because I had forgotten to put it on the list after I used the last one, so I needed to go buy some that night or else I probably wouldn’t have made these at all! Being in college and all, I cannot bake during the week so I either had to make them Sunday or never. Unluckily for me, it seemed like everyone and their mother was making pumpkin something this week because I had to go to THREE different grocery stores to find some puree. Everyone was out! What’s even worse was that when I did find some they only had a HUGE 29 oz can. (That’s over 3-1/2 cups of pumpkin puree and this recipe only called for 3/4 cup).

I wasn’t about to make fifty million pumpkin muffins so I went on a quest to find many more enticing pumpkin recipes. Cookies, breads, cakes, waffles, sauces, pies! There were so many things to choose from! For the time being I settled on two breakfast recipes (who doesn’t love pumpkin early in the day?), pumpkin pancakes and pumpkin scones.

I had always wanted to give scones a try and when I came across a Pumpkin Spice Scone recipe on Pinch My Salt, I immediately knew that it was something I had to make. Why not, right? I had to use up all the puree someway! These scones were fantastic by themselves and even better with the maple ginger and cinnamon icing (my favorite of the two) that the author suggested you should use.

My dad had requested pumpkin waffles, but being more of a pancake lover I made pancakes instead. He had complaints either way considering I was offering to make breakfast. I found a great recipe for these pancakes at Allrecipes.com and would suggest that all other pumpkin loving people give it a try! They are light, fluffy, and are accompanied by just enough pumpkin flavor to be delicious. No wonder they were the highest rated pumpkin pancake recipe on the site! (Although I’d like to note that it says it serves six, which I found out doesn’t mean six pancakes. It makes A LOT of pancake batter so keep that in mind!)

Of course, I ended up using all of the ginger making breakfast so in the end I had to go to the grocery store on Sunday anyways. It was fine though! The billions of grocery store trips were completely worth it! Also, I wasn’t too fond of using raisins, nuts, and sunflowers seeds in my muffins. I guess I’m just not adventurous enough for that so instead I went old fashion and mixed in some chocolate chunks and sprinkled the batter with some cinnamon sugar (1 teaspoon cinnamon with 2 tablespoons sugar) before baking. Being a cupcake fanatic and not much of a muffin eater, it should really be no surprise that  I instinctively thought to add more sugar to these, causing them to be more like cupcakes than muffins. As cupcakes or muffins, these things are still pretty darn good.

After these three recipes, and basically indulging on only pumpkin flavored foods all morning, I had had enough pumpkin to last me for a while. Sad, too, because I still have quite a lot of pumpkin puree left. Oh well! At least I tried to use it all, right?

After secretly stalking and anxiously awaiting the reveal of new challenges for months, I finally went and joined the Daring Bakers for myself! It was a good thing too because for this challenge we had to make chocolate eclairs, but not just any chocolate eclairs! Oh no, sir! These sugarcoated little creatures come from none other than Pierre Hermé, a famous and fantastically gifted French pastry chef that’s an inspiration for me and I’m sure for many, many more.

Before I go any further, I’d like to note that I wrote this entire entry and then Firefox screwed me over and I lost it all. Yes, Firefox, I am very angry at you right now! If your rival IE didn’t suck so much I’d probably make him my new best friend instead. WHAT DO YOU SAY TO THAT, FIREFOX!?

Anyways, this challenge was hosted by Tony and Meeta. You can go to their blogs in order to view the original recipe because it is incredibly long and I am feeling way too lazy to post all it. (However, do not let the length discourage you from making these eclairs because they are fantastic and definitely not as hard as they seem. In fact, I’d say this is was one of the easier challenges I’ve seen the Daring Bakers do so far.) Their posts are also much more graphic than mine would have ever been and having a visual is always a good thing when baking something foreign.

For this challenge we were allowed to change one of two things. We could choose our own glaze OR our own filling, but we couldn’t change both. I decided to change the filling because I hate having too much chocolate (although I definitely regret this choice). Instead of the chocolate pastry cream (which sounded deliciousss), I made a vanilla bean one. Also, because my favorite donuts are the ones with maple glaze, I made that as well to stripe over the eclairs.

I thought I’d really like this vanilla pastry cream, but it just reminded me of the pastry cream that they use in donuts, which I have never been a fan of. Actually, now that I think about, I’ve never really liked cream filled anything.

Vanilla Bean Pastry Cream

(From Joy of Baking)

• 3 large egg yolks
• 1/4 cup granulate sugar
• 1/8 cup all-purpose flour
• Scant 3 tablespoons cornstarch
• 1-1/4 cup milk
• 1/2 vanilla bean, split lengthwise

1. In a medium-sized stainless steel bowl, mix the sugar and egg yolks together with a wooden spoon. (Never let the mixture sit too long or you will get pieces of egg forming.)
2. Sift the flour and cornstarch together and then add to the egg mixture, mixing until you get a smooth paste. Set aside.
3. Meanwhile in a saucepan combine the milk and split vanilla bean on medium heat until boiling. (The milk will foam up to the top of pan when done, so watch carefully.) Remove from heat and add slowly to egg mixture, whisking constantly to prevent curdling. (If you get a few pieces of egg (curdling) in the mixture, pour through a strainer.) Remove vanilla bean, scrape out seeds, and add the seeds to the egg mixture.
4. Place the egg mixture back into a medium saucepan and cook over medium heat until boiling, whisking constantly. When it boils, whisk mixture constantly for another 30 – 60 seconds until it becomes very thick and it is hard to stir.
5. Pour into a clean bowl and immediately cover the surface with plastic wrap to prevent a crust from forming. Cool. If not using right away refrigerate until needed, up to 3 days. Beat before using to get rid of any lumps that may have formed.

Maple Glaze

(From Pastrywiz)

• 1-1/4 cups confectioners sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/4 cup pure maple syrup

1. In a bowl, combine confectioners’ sugar and vanilla. Gradually whisk in enough maple syrup to make a smooth, thick glaze. (I think I actually added more confectioners sugar than required.)

Although these eclairs were good, I do not think I’ll ever make them again, or at least not for myself. Like donuts, I am not a fan of anything cream filled and eclairs were no exception. I’m really not sure why that is. Maybe I just don’t like pastry cream?

If you’re really interested in making these for yourself I’d definitely suggest going to the Daring Bakers’ Blogroll and visiting some of the other blogs. Everyone gets so creative and I’m sure there were MANY variations to these eclairs that would suit almost everyone’s fancy.

Tiramisu has to be one of my all time favorite desserts, but I rarely ever get to have it. It’s usually one of the first things I think about making when I want to bake, but a lot of the ingredients aren’t exactly common items that you have lying around (e.g. lady fingers, mascarpone, and coffee liqueur). However, I finally managed to get my hands on Kahlua liqueur and Bailey’s Irish Cream (not being 21 makes that a hassle to get) and couldn’t wait to do something with it.

Now how sad is this? Most kids cannot wait to turn 21 in order to be able to legally purchase their own alcohol and go out drinking whenever they want, but I only want to turn 21 so I can actually go into a liquor store and buy ingredients. I wish they at least allowed you to go inside if you’re 18, but no. I’m not even allowed to see what my choices are. Luckily I have great parents that will go and buy it for me.

So now I had the liqueur just sitting in the pantry waiting to be used. What was I going to make? Considering I hadn’t originally planned on baking I didn’t prepare myself with the other ingredients required for tiramisu, but I did manage to find a tiramisu ice cream recipe that I had all the ingredients for. How perfect! So it’s not quite tiramisu, but it’s still something fun to make. I love ice cream and I love tiramisu so a combination of the two couldn’t be bad, right?

Tiramisu Ice Cream

(Adapted from Desert Candy and The Perfect Scoop)

• 2 cups mascarpone (or 8 oz cream cheese and 1 cup sour cream)
• 2/3 cup whole milk
• 2/3 cup cream
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup Kahlua liqueur
• 3 tablespoons brandy or rum (I actually used Marsala)
• Pinch of salt
• Espresso chocolate (see recipe below)

Note: you can substitute 1 1/3 cups half-and-half for the milk and cream.

Espresso Chocolate

• 6 oz chocolate, chopped (I used semi-sweet chips)
• 1/2 cup strongly brewed espresso

Note: You can substitute espresso for 1 tablespoon espresso powder or even ground coffee.

Melt chocolate in a double boiler, then mix in espresso until fully combined. Do not allow the mixture to harden before adding to the ice cream.

1. Place all ingredients (except chocolate) in a blender and blend until smooth.
2. Chill mixture in your refrigerator for at least 1 hour.
3. Churn the mixture in your ice cream maker according to it’s specific instructions.
4. A few minutes before the ice cream is expected to be finished, prepare your chocolate mixture. However, keep it in your double boiler so that the chocolate does not harden.
5. When the ice cream is nearly done, with the machine still running, slowly and carefully drizzle chocolate directly onto the ice cream as it continues to churn. Be careful not to add too much at once or else the chocolate will clump up rather than form flecks. I found that using a fork makes things a lot easier to thin it out.
6. Transfer ice cream to a freezer safe container and allow ice cream to freeze for about an hour or until firm before serving.

I later got the idea to add chocolate flecks when looking at recipes for stracciatella ice cream. Stracciatella is a popular flavor in Italy, consisting of vanilla ice cream and pieces of chocolate. A type of mozarella and even egg-drop soup are often referred to as stracciatella as well. In Italian it literally means “little rags”, which in this case refers to the flecks of chocolate throughout the ice cream.

I decided to incorporate David Lebovitz’s recipe for a mocha ripple in my ice cream by drizzling in espresso chocolate instead. I altered it a bit so mine would be more like chocolate chips and less like a ripple. The ripple sounded neat and all, but who doesn’t love pieces of chocolate too? Considering I was also craving mint chocolate chip ice cream at the time I figured it’d be a good idea replace the ripple with espresso chocolate chips.

Even though it didn’t taste like I was eating tiramisu in the form of ice cream, in my opinion, it still came out great! It actually tasted more like cheesecake ice cream to me, but then again my sense of taste has been absolutely terrible lately so maybe it was just like that for me. In the future, I’ll probably make a form of this ice cream again, but do a few things a little differently (like making sure I actually have some rum to use).

I do not have the pleasure of baking as often as I’d like because my family is often always on some sort of diet. As much as I’d enjoy eating a plate full of cookies or a dozen deliciously unhealthy cupcakes, I’d much rather eat one and share the rest with other people. Luckily, this weekend was father’s day weekend, my father’s birthday, AND my friend’s birthday. That meant my father would be allowed to break his diet and have whatever I baked AND I could give some of the extras to my friend.

So as usual, I went on my almighty quest to find the next type of cupcakes that most appealed to my fancy. With so many amazing types how was I ever going to choose just one? After countless of long and brutal browses through cupcake images on Flickr and many voyages deep into the vicious jungle of baking blogs, my journey was complete! I finally found the cupcakes I wanted to make!

Turtle & Peanut Butter Cup Cupcakes!

Turtle Cupcakes: Dark chocolate cupcake, caramel filling, dark chocolate ganache, vanilla buttercream frosting, caramel drizzle, pecan pieces, and some Valrhona chocolate shavings.

Peanut Butter Cup Cupcakes: Dark chocolate cupcake, peanut butter filling, dark chocolate ganache, peanut butter frosting, Reese’s peanut butter cup pieces, and chocolate drizzled on top.

They were both absolutely amazing. I’m actually not sure which one I liked the most because they each contained something I definitely love (peanut butter and caramel). The cupcakes came out moist and delicious and coupled with the filling made them even better. Although, I’d definitely suggest eating the peanut butter cup ones with a big glass of milk because all that peanut butter is sure hard to swallow!

The recipe I used was a combination of many recipes from many other websites. There is a list to where I got them all at the very end and I would certainly urge everyone to check out the sites because they are all fantastic (especially Chockylit’s Cupcake Blog).

Dark Chocolate Cupcakes

(About 16 cupcakes @ 350 degrees)

• 8 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into 4 pieces
• 2 oz bittersweet chocolate, chopped (I used 56% Valrhona)
• 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa
• 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 2 large eggs
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup sour cream
• 1/2 cup dark chocolate chips (optional)

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. Chop the chocolate and place into a double boiler.
3. Add butter and cocoa and stir until the chocolate melts and the mixture fully combines.
4. Remove from heat and set aside to cool until just warm enough to touch. (About 10 minutes.)
5. Sift the flour, baking soda, and baking powder into a small bowl and set aside.
6. In an electric mixer beat eggs well for a few seconds.
7. Add sugar, vanilla, and salt and beat until well combined.
8. Add cooled chocolate mixture and beat until well combined.
9. Add about one-third of the dry ingredients into the mixture and beat briefly until combined.
10. Add about half of the sour cream and beat until combined.
11. Continue adding, alternating between the dry ingredients and sour cream, and finish with the dry.
12. Stir in chocolate chips. (optional)
13. Scoop batter into cupcake cups about 2/3 full. Bake at 350 degrees for about 18-20 minutes or until a cake tester comes out clean.

Chocolate Ganache

• 1/2 cup dark chocolate, chopped (I used 56% Valrhona)
• 1/3 cup heavy cream

1. Chop the chocolate into pieces and place in a small bowl.
2. Heat the heavy cream in a small saucepan until it just starts to boil.
3. Pour the cream over the chocolate and stir until blended. Let the ganache cool for 15 minutes or until it begins to thicken before spreading on cupcakes.

Turtle Cupcakes

Caramel Filling

• 3/4 cup evaporated milk
• 7 oz (or more) wrapped caramels, unwrapped

1. Combine evaporated milk and 7 oz of caramels in double boiler over medium heat.
2. Stir until caramels are melted and the mixture is smooth.
3. Continue adding more caramels in order to achieve the desired consistency. I ended up using about 2/3 of the Kraft caramel. (optional)

Vanilla Buttercream

• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1 tablespoon milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2-3 cups powdered sugar

1. Using an electric mixer, beat the butter at medium speed until creamy.
2. Add the milk, vanilla extract, and 2 cups of powdered sugar and beat at low speed, occasionally stopping to scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl, until light and fluffy. Add more powdered sugar to arrive at the consistency and sweetness you like.

Assembly

1. Using a small pairing knife, cut out a circular cone from the top of the cupcake and slice off pointy end.
2. Fill the hole with caramel filling and replace the top.
3. Scoop ganache onto cupcake and smooth evenly with an icing spatula.
4. Refrigerate for about 10 minutes in order for the ganache to harden a bit.
5. Pipe vanilla buttercream frosting onto cupcake and add extra toppings if desired. (I drizzled on some of the caramel filling, sprinkled on Valrhona chocolate shavings, and topped a few with pecan pieces.)

Peanut Butter Cup Cupcakes

Peanut Butter Filling

I had intended to use the peanut butter frosting as a filling, but the first frosting recipe I chose turned out rather thick (maybe because I used natural peanut butter for it). The recipe can be found here if you want to use it, but otherwise you can simply use the frosting recipe I later chose as a filling instead.

Peanut Butter Frosting

• 1/4 cup (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1 cup creamy peanut butter
• 2 cup powdered sugar
• 1/2 cup heavy cream

1. Sift the powdered sugar into a small bowl and set aside.
2. In an electric mixer at medium-low speed, combine butter, peanut butter, and sugar until well blended.
3. Add heavy cream and increase speed to high until frosting looks light and fluffy

Assembly

1. Using a small pairing knife, cut out a circular cone from the top of the cupcake and slice off pointy end.
2. Fill the hole with peanut butter frosting and replace the top.
3. Scoop ganache onto cupcake and smooth evenly with an icing spatula.
4. Refrigerate for about 10 minutes in order for the ganache to harden.
5. Pipe peanut butter frosting onto cupcake and add extra toppings if desired. (I drizzled on some melted semi-sweet chocolate and sprinkled on pieces of chopped up Reese’s peanut butter cups)

Recipe resources:

Dark Chocolate Cupcakes: smcgee’s cupcakes

Chocolate Ganache: Cupcake Project

Vanilla Buttercream: Cupcake Bakeshop

Peanut Butter Filling: Eggs on Sunday (It’s their frosting recipe)

Peanut Butter Frosting: Slashfood

All gone!