S'mores Cake balls

Gosh, I love this movie! I was just talking to RJ about it yesterday. He has never seen this movie... I know, CRAZY! This is a a perfect summer time movie.

I made these cake balls last month for my sisters birthday- yay, Happy Birthday! We all went to the beach, ate subs, drank beer and had s'more cake balls. I adore cake balls, because they are popable little bites. You don't have to worry about slicing a cake, just take a ball and 2 bites later it's on to the next one. Or you can wait to have another one. Maybe I like them more because I feel like a heifer when I keep slicing two-bite slices of cake.

Don't act like you don't know what I'm taking about... we all go back to the pan at some point and just slice a sliver because we want something sweet, but not a whole slice and then you go back like five minutes later and do it again, then again then you realize you've had the equivalence of a whole slice so all those trips were no pointless... okay maybe you don't do that - maybe I do - either, either, I don't judge. Any who, cake balls are rockin'.

I used a box of white cake mix, my toasted marshmallow frosting, chocolate melting candy, and crushed graham crackers. I prefer my grahams to be a chunky crushed. I think when you crush them too fine they loose the graham flavor, but that's just a personal choice. Feel free to crush them however you see fit.

If you've never made cake balls, they are kinda tricky. I suggest you go to bakerella's website and check out her tutorials. She will give you a much better explanation than I can. But a helpful hint: the stickier your marshmallow frosting, the better the cake balls hold together. I probably used close to 20 marshmallows to 3 cups of powdered sugar.

Directions:

Follow directions on cake box. Allow cake to completely cool before crumbling.

 

Frosting Recipe

 

Make frosting. Add frosting, very carefully not to add too much frosting, if you do, the balls will not hold up. I suggest adding a dollop or two at a time. When the cake starts to mush together and stay together without a lot of crumble, roll cake into balls. I roll mine about 1- 1.5 inches.

Place balls on a lined cooking sheet, cover and place in the fridge for a few hours. This allows the cake and frosting to make  a stronger bond, which you need since you are dipping them in warm chocolate.

Crush the grahams into a bowl. Melt the chocolate according to the package. Take the balls out of the fridge. One at a time, cover the balls in chocolate, shake off the excess then drop them into the graham. Once they have grahams on them, transfer them back to the cookie sheet so the chocolate can harden. When all the balls are covered and rested transfer them to a seal able container. If it is hot where you are living I suggest keeping them in the refrigerator.

These really are delicious! Make them for your next summer bash, they will be a hit.

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Tiramisu Cupcakes

I am super sleepy today. I have not been sleeping well lately but today I finally slept in. *Phew* I was feeling so rested I went for a 6 mile run. About 4 miles in I was wishing I had only done a 4 mile run, but I toughened up and trucked through the final two. Then I went  to vote, doing my civic duty! Then I meet up with some friends for lunch, then came home and went on a two mile walk. So now, I'm sleepy. My New Years resolution was to run at least 30 miles a month, so far I'm ahead of schedule :) But let's face it, you don't want to know about my day. You want to know about these delicious cupcakes.

Turns out, I had no idea that tiramisu marscapone  was already coffee flavored. I thought marscapone was unflavored, just creamy dreamy cheese like cream cheese. But I'm glad that I was wrong, because this made making these cupcakes easier. These lovies are definitely in my top 5 favorites and I'm guessing they will be in yours too, if you make them.

I was having a tough- gotta be an adult day- yesterday and desperately needed to retreat to my sanctuary of baking. So I did a quick check in my fridge for inspiration and realized I had marscapone from when I thought about about making cupcakes earlier. Naturally the only thing I think of when I see marscapone is tiramisu and then ta-da tiramisu cupcakes. Trust me, this cake will get you out of any funk. I was literally jumping up in down in my kitchen I was so pleased.

Luckily RJ loves tiramisu and I love cupcakes, so we love this dessert. Do you have a favorite dessert you want to convert into a cupcake?  I also want to say and quick chat with some of my favorites really boosted my mood too :)  But if nothing else, make this frosting-oh who am I kidding, make these babies.

Cupcake:

Preheat one 350 line  24 muffin wells 

3 C. Flour
1 tsp Baking Powder
1/2 tsp Salt
3/4 C Butter (12 Tbs)
1 1/2 C. Sugar
4 Eggs
1 C. Buttermilk
3 tsp Vanilla

In a bowl combine and sift flour, baking powder and salt, set aside. In mixer beat butter until light then add sugar, combine until fluffed. Add eggs one at a time until combined and then add vanilla. Alternately add milk and flour mixture to butter mixture, starting and ending with the flour. Mix until just combined. Fill muffin wells to 2/3 full and bake for 18-20 minutes or until and inserted knife comes out clean. Allow cupcakes to cool for 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack. Let cupcakes completely before adding filling.
Filling:
8oz Tiramisu Marscapone cheese
1 C. Powdered Sugar
3 Tbs Cream

Put ingredients into bowl and blend until smooth. Cut out a hole in the top of the cupcake, about the size of a dime. Insert knife at and angle and cut a circle. Do not throw away  this piece!  Fill the hole with the filling and press the cut out cake back into the hole. Top cake with Frosting. Dust with Cocoa Powder

Frosting:
1 Tbs Instant Espresso
3/4 C. Butter
1 tsp Vanilla
1 tsp Rum
2 Tbs Cream
3 C. Powdered Sugar
Blend Instant espresso and butter. Add vanilla, rum and 1 cup sugar, mix well. Add cream and 1 cup powdered sugar, blend then add last cup of sugar. Add more powdered sugar or cream if needed.

Enjoy, enjoy, enjoy. I love these.

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Orange Chocolate Chip Cake

I love, love, love the combination of orange and chocolate. It rocks my world. As it so happens, oranges are super cheap here right now.(weird considering winter is their prime growing season) but hey I'm not complaining. I also happened to have a spare bag of mini chocolate chips hanging around- so my wheels went a-turning. Think Meghann, think. So I thought, "duh- Moms toll house cake"but add orange zest and orange glaze.

I perused my recipe box and found what I was looking for. I cannot guarantee my mom invented this recipe but then again I do not know where she found it. I adapted this recipe since her original one didn't call for oranges. But my changes aren't too much different, just a bit.

Let me start by telling you, this recipe is super simple, but I screwed it up. Whomp.. whomp...whamp. Every chef aspiring baker goes awry once in a while, this week was my turn. First  a little back story: While I was out getting some brown sugar for the cake, I decided to pick up a box of butterscotch pudding because I love that too.  When I got home from the store I followed the directions on the box, add 2 cups of cold milk, stir and put in the fridge. People this is probably the most simple recipe ever and I messed it up. Aye de me. Turns out if you use soy milk to make instant pudding you need to use less milk (awesome! I didn't know this) So my pudding never set up.

Next failure was my cake. I was super excited because the batter tasted amazing before I popped it in the oven. I had high hopes. I even told RJ, this is going to be awesome. 40 minutes later, the baking gods had set me up for disaster. It was U-G-L-Y it had no alibi. Depressed I swore off baking. Only to be reminded by RJ, if at first you don't succeed, try again. I rolled my eyes, gave a heavy sigh and walked out the door... to the grocery store. I needed more supplies, I wasn't going to let the cake get the best of me.

My second go round was a cinch (just like I thought the first one was) only I remembered to add all of the flour into my mix and not just part of it. PEOPLE - remember to put in the correct amount of ingredients if you want a happy product.

So the moral of this story is: sometimes you have bad cooking weeks, get over it and get back into it.

Chocolate Chip Cake:
2 1/4 C flour
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
1/2c butter, softened
1 C firmly packed brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla
2 eggs
1/4 C milk
1 12oz pkg MINI (not the regular size!!) chocolate chips
Zest of 1 orange

Preheat oven to 350. Combine dry ingredients; set aside. Save a little of the flour mixture to dust the chocolate chips with.  Mix butter and sugar until fluffy; add vanilla, eggs and zest, beating well. Alternately blend in flour mixture and milk to creamed mixture. Stir in chips. Bake in greased and floured Bundt pan for 45-50 minutes. Allow to cool before removing from pan

Orange Glaze:
2 C. Powdered Sugar
1/2 tsp Vanilla
Juice of half and Orange
Zest of half and orange

Stir ingredients together until smooth and set aside until cake is almost cooled. Once you flip the cake onto it's final resting place, drizzle half the glaze over the top, add more glaze if you like it sweet or add on to each individual slice as you go.

I'd like to say this combination is great. It's sweet and goes great with a cup of milk.

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Birthday Cake Cupcakes

I am in love, sweet-sugary-can't-get-enough love, and it's with these cupcakes. It's almost like I added an addictive substance that I crave...but I didn't! These are pure gotta make them ASAP cupcakes, or at least make the frosting and eat it with a spoon. These babies are vanilla cupcakes with cake batter frosting.

This weekend RJ and I went for  ice cream and I got a cake batter flavor and I was inspired to make this flavor into a cupcake. I mean why not? Practically everyone loves cake batter and if you don't, that's weird...(no offense) or maybe a little :) So I ran with that idea. I had some box cake mix  and a vanilla cupcake recipe I was trying to perfect so why not, it's like the Gods were speaking to me.

There is a tragic story about this recipe too. My hand mixer broke AND my spatula - dun dun dun. It really was an awful experience, but it was lessened by how delicious this frosting is. Which brings me to my next point, always make sure you add ingredients in the proper order and always make sure your ingredients are room temperature. I think these reasons, and the fact that my mixer is super old, is why it broke and my spatula too. Lesson learned people, lesson learned.

Do you have any disastrous baking stories? I look froward to getting out of my baking slump, it's a bit annoying. Do you have a favorite ice cream that you think should be turned into a cupcake? I really want to try converting a tin roof sundae into a cupcake - love that idea-

I don't have a great vanilla recipe for you yet, it's in the works. In the meantime use your favorite cake flavor and top with this frosting. YOU WILL NOT REGRET IT!

Frosting:

1 C. Cake Mix
2-3 C. Powdered Sugar
1 Stick Butter
4 oz Cream Cheese
1/2 tsp. Vanilla
1/2 tsp. Almond extract
3 Tbs Milk

Make sure all ingredients are room temperature :)

Blend together the cream cheese and butter, until smooth. Add cake mix and vanilla. Blend in powdered sugar and milk until desired consistency. This will be a thicker frosting, but not absurdly thick - just delicious.

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Gluten Free and Fabulous

Oh gluten free, where do I begin? It seems to me that being allergic to gluten has become very prominent our society whether it be by choice or because you have an intolerance/allergy to it. Either way, I'm super glad I can eat it with no issues. For those who are less fortunate, you don't have to leave out dessert! The world has developed umpteen million different gluten free flours that you can make a million different more desserts with.

I was a little scared to try gluten free. I didn't know what to expect. I didn't know if my product would tasted different. I wasn't sure if  I'd have to adjust making baking time -etc etc. You get my drift, I had a lot of doubts and questions. Turns out, I didn't have to be worried, which means you don't need to be either!

All I did was take a cupcake recipe and switched out my regular flour to multipurpose gluten free flour. Then, I took my coconut cupcake recipe and adapted it to one of my favorite flavor combinations - coconut orange. I think I told you about my moms orange-coconut coffee cake that's out of this world before, but if not, it rocks my socks off :) I really wanted to mimic this delicious flavor into a cupcake and I wanted everyone at work to be able to try it. So I'd like to present to you gluten-free orange coconut cupcakes. And just as a heads up to you, if you don't want gluten free- just use regular flour.

Oh and as a disclaimer - I find gluten flour to be a little grainier tasting then regular flour. I haven't done enough experimenting to figure out how to remove that... Have you done gluten free baking? Do you want to make a cupcake using your flavor combination? What flavors would you use?

Cupcake:
3/4 C. Butter
1 1/4 C. Sugar
3 Eggs
1 C. Coconut Milk - minus 2 Tbs
2 Tbs Orange Juice
1/2 tsp. Vanilla
1 tsp Coconut extract
1 1/4 C. All purpose gluten free flour (King Arthur)
1 C. Coconut Flour
1 tsp Salt
1 tsp Baking Powder
1/2 C. Shredded Coconut
Rind of 1 Orange

Preheat oven 350 line 12 muffin wells

Sift together flour, baking powder, and salt.
Mix together shredded coconut and orange peel,set aside.
Combine orange juice and coconut milk, set aside.
Beat butter till light then add sugar, combine until light a fluffy. Add eggs one at a time. Scrape sides and add extracts. Alternately add dry and wet ingredients starting and ending with dry. Fold in coconut/orange mix. Fill wells 3/4 full (if you use gluten free ingredients it won't rise much) Bake 18-20 minutes. Allow cupcakes to cool 5 minutes in pan then transfer to rack to finish cooling.

Frosting -
8oz Cream cheese
1/2 C. Butter
3 Tbs Orange Juice
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/2 tsp coconut extract
3 C. Powdered Sugar
1 C.Shredded Coconut + 1 Orange rind + 1 Tbs Sugar combine (may need more depending on how much topping you like on your cupcakes)

Blend cream cheese and butter. Add 1 cup powdered sugar and extracts, blend. Alternately add sugar and OJ. Once frosting is to the consistency you like frost your cakes. Then sprinkle with coconut orange topping.

Eat your heart out.

Peace.

Happy late Thanksgiving

Hi there and Happy late Thanksgiving! I am very thankful for a lot of things everyday and maybe some days I forget that I am... I'm going to try not to do that anymore. I will remember to take the good with the bad, the happy with the sad and the roasted potato's with the prime rib... wait, what?
Yea, that was the best segway into me telling you what I did for thanksgiving. I don't have a personal recipe to share with you, just a few stories that can help you pass your time. What did you do for thanksgiving and what are you especially thankful for?

This year RJ and I stayed in and it was super fun. I made him wake up extra early and cheer me on at my 8k Turkey trot, whatta good guy. I finished in  45:43 which I am excited about since I didn't even think I would finish in 47 minutes. Yay for running! We came home and made a big breakfast - orange/coconut coffee cake, bacon, eggs and OJ (RJ also has a bagel.) Then we settled in to watch the Lions take on the Packers. As you know, I am a loyal Lions fan, and sometimes it's really hard to be dedicated to an inconsistent team, but every game I tune in, cheer and hope for the best. Thursday's game incase you missed, was a little rough... but there's always next time!

After the game we had prime rib, roasted potato's, rolls and salad - yummy! Dessert was pumpkin cheesecake, so easy and so simple. The recipe I used was one from Paula Deen. I used cinnamon graham crackers instead of regular ones for a special kick.

After dinner we relaxed until we took on Black Friday. I had never been shopping on Black Friday morning, it was kind of fun, but mostly it was fun because I found some super cute shoes at a ridiculous deal! How do you say no? - hint: you don't.
The rest of our long weekend has been pretty chill. I hope you had a fabulous weekend and I will get out a fabulous cupcake recipe soon oh and a funny story about my dog!

Honolulu Blue Velvet Cupcakes

I have a favorite football team, do you? I go to a bar every Sunday and watch them play. I am a fan even when their season is 0-16 (yikes!) I make cupcakes in honor of their first Monday night game in 10 years! I love the Detroit Lions*sigh* I'll admit, it's not always easy being a Lions fan. In fact, until this year, we always got heat for supporting them! But not anymore, they are 5-0, by the time I post this 6-0 (knock on wood) Their tickets have like tripled in price, every game is like the Super Bowl for us fans. I am loyal to them, but not as crazy as my brother about them, I bet he's probably close to being their number one fan. In fact, I bet I wouldn't even be the fan I am today if it weren't for him. So a little shout out to my brother, these cakes are for you too!

I have been waiting to make a red velvet cake just until I could make it for the Lions. Maybe a but dorky, but like I said, I'm a fan. All I did was take a red velvet recipe and switched red for blue. This is a traditional straight up velvet cake, no fuss, no muss.

I will admit, I was a bit scared to make these. I was intimidated by this oh-so delicious cake and I'm not embarrassed to say it. Hi, my name is Meghann and I am was scared to make red velvet cupcakes. As I  said I kept it traditional, even down to the cream cheese frosting. I just switched it up with a blue fondant lion with edible sparkle.

The blue I used was a combo of food gel and liquid dye, it really did make them look a little more teal than Honolulu Blue, but really it is the thought that counts.

OK-- let me just say, I'm watching the Detroit Tiger play game 5 in the playoffs against the Texas Rangers, and I swear these umps are paid... *ugh* but then again every time my team gets a bad call I think the refs are begin paid. But for reals, this game drives me nuts, they are pitching to people they should walk, pitcher keeps throwing balls (ha- cause it's a base ball) instead of strikes. I mean, c'mon man, this is your job, and this game is uber important, FOCUS!
Back to the cake... Make it, it's tasty and moist and a classic.

Velvet Cupcakes:
(Recipe from Joy of baking)
Preheat oven 350* line 8-12 cupcake wells.
1 1/4  C. Flour
1/4 tsp. Baking  Powder
1/4 tsp. Salt
1 Tbs. Cocoa powder
1/4 C. Butter
3/4 C. Sugar
1 Egg
1/2 tsp. Vanilla
1/2 C. Buttermilk
1 Tbs Food Coloring of choice
1/2 tsp. Distilled Vinegar
1/2 tsp. Baking Soda

In a medium bowl sift flour, baking powder, salt and cocoa powder set  side.
In a small bowl combine buttermilk and food coloring set aside.
In the mixing bowl beat butter then add sugar until light and fluffy. Add vanilla then egg. Scrape sides then begin alternate adds of liquids and flour mixture. In a separate small bowl combine baking soda and vinegar. Let is fizz then quickly combine it into the mix, but do not over mix.

Line muffin wells and fill 2/3 full. Bake fore 18-23 minutes. Cool in tin for 5 minutes then transfer to rack to finish cooling. Once cooled frost with your favorite cream cheese frosting.

Cream Cheese Frosting:
1/2 C. Butter
8 oz Cream Cheese
1 tsp Vanilla
2 Tbs Milk
3 C. Powdered Sugar

In a bowl combine the room temperature butter and cream cheese. Add the vanilla and one cup of the powdered sugar, mix. Next the milk and one more cup of the powdered sugar can be added, mix. Gradually add the final cup until it is spreading consistency, you may need more or less than this final cup depends on what you like!

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