Coconut, Lime, and Honey Cupcakes

Happy spring!  It’s been quite a long time.  I feel as if I’ve exhausted a lot of cupcake flavor possibilities, and it is a rare occasion when a new idea pops into my head.  These cupcakes were baked for Easter last Sunday.  Our family has a new addition, my baby nephew Cyrus, and he was a week old on Easter!  Because things were crazy and his mommy and daddy were taking it easy, we had an Easter lunch of sandwiches and salad. Delicious sandwiches and salad.

Due to the lighter lunch, I wanted a nice, not to heavy cupcake to have for dessert.  This was the result!

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Key Lime Cupcakes

Last year I offered my baking services to the Sacramento Children’s Chorus and pledged to bake a dessert each month for the highest bidder in a silent auction.  I’ve actually loved fulfilling my commitment because the winner has requested some desserts that are not in my regular arsenal.  This month, he requested a key lime pie.  As I set out to baking said pie today, I looked around my kitchen.  I had lime juice, zest, and enough whipped cream topping to act as frosting!

And the Key Lime Cupcake was born.

I wanted this cupcake to be super light, so I decided on a white cake as the base.  This also work well since I only used egg yolks for the key lime pie.  Yay to me for being efficient with my ingredients!  The white cake, kicked up a notch with lime juice and zest, turned out fluffy and cloud-like.    Because of this, I’m really glad I decided to use a whipped cream topping.  Anything else, like a butter cream or cream cheese frosting, would be so heavy I swear these little cakes would collapse.

With the frosting, I’m trying something new: stabilized whipped cream.  I found instructions for it here and it claims that the addition of the gelatin adds a bit more body and prevents the melting of the whipped cream as the cakes sit and wait to be eaten.  Because I’ll be taking these to share with co-workers and fellow volunteers tomorrow, I think that this whipped cream was the perfect choice.

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Happy Spring! Strawberry Cupcakes with Lemon Swiss Meringue Buttercream

Saddened by the cupcake not looking that pretty…but they tasted wonderful!

I’ve been dreaming about that Swiss meringue buttercream since I made the Andes Mint Cupcakes!  The texture was so silky and light, like a cloud.  I knew I had to do another cupcake with it, so I did.

In my CSA produce delivery box I received both strawberries and lemons this week.  So, that became the theme for today.  I usually use all of my CSA delivery to inspire my dinners, and I rarely use it in baking.  But this just made sense.  I mean, spring is starting, today was Easter Sunday, and a strawberry and lemon cupcake will be absolutely perfect.

Also, my parents recently purchased a stand mixer.  Having never even played with one before, and as I was making cupcakes at their house today, I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to try out a Swiss meringue buttercream the “easy” way.

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49er Faithful – Black Forest Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting

It has finally happened – the San Francisco 49ers have prevailed and will be playing in the Super Bowl this Sunday!  My father has claimed that his children have always brought the 49ers luck.  A month after my brother was born, our boys won their first national championship.  Just 15 days after I was born, they won their second.  They have been undefeated since then in their five Super Bowl games.  I am just hoping with all hope that this Sunday they can make it six!

To celebrate, I have developed a deep, rich, and tangy cupcake to show my love for my team.  I am borrowing my all-time favorite chocolate cupcake recipe (developed for a Super Bowl party three years ago), filling it with tangy and boozey cherries, with a topping of red and gold pride in the form of a rich cream cheese frosting.  Start the cherry filling a few days ahead so the cherries can reach full re-hydration and flavor.

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This Year’s Easter Dessert – Mimosa Cupcakes!

Mimosa Cupcake

I made a cupcake similar to these for a friend’s birthday during the break from the blog.  But here they are now, ready for Easter!  I don’t know about anyone else,  but our family celebrates any holiday with some wine, beer, or any other drink.  So, mimosa cupcakes are great for our Easter dessert.

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A Return to Cupcakes: The White Linen

White Linen Cupcake

A very simple and fresh drink, the white linen, has become a Sacramento staple of mine.  I first had a white linen at The Shady Lady Saloon, a jazz age bar in midtown with creative cocktails and delicious food.  Come to find out, the cocktail was invented by a Sacramento area bartender who has also worked at Ella Dining Room, a very swanky place that makes me wish I had more money.  I love Ella’s gin and tonic (they make their own tonic water), and I would really like to try their rendition of the white linen when it’s on their seasonal cocktail menu.

Anyway, the white linen reminds me of a gin and tonic with lemon and cucumber.  Fresh and clean, just like new linens. :)

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Orange-Cranberry Cupcakes

Continuing with the fall themed cupcakes, I bring you….Orange-Cranberry!  The result of these was wonderful; they were tart and sweet at the same time.  Next time, I would experiment with using fresh, seasonal cranberries instead of dried ones.

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Dark and Stormy: Vegan Rum & Ginger Cupcakes

cupcakes, complete and covered in rum syrup.

I have an enormous bottle of rum.  I guess it’s really not that enormous, but rum isn’t something I drink with any great frequency.  Thus, the only use this rum has seen has been in cupcakes.  Upon deciding (I really have been hitting the 19th century literature hard the last few weeks) I was well enough to bake again, I decided on rum cupcakes.  With ginger.  Some preliminary research on the subject brought me to the idea of a Dark and Stormy, which fits very well into my theory that cocktails make fine inspiration for baked goods.

(Note to the purists:  I did not buy Goslings.  I have a budget for my cupcake and drinking forays, I already have rum, and it’s a pain to get to the liquor store.)

Anyways.

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Gluten Free Cupcakes: Lemon Almond

Lemon Almond Gluten Free Cupcakes

A friend of mine who recently had a birthday has  a twin sister who is gluten-intolerant, so when the invite for the potluck party was made, it was pretty clear that I was going to make gluten-free cupcakes.

Since it is finally summer in this city, it seemed like a citrus-combo cupcake was a best-fit for the weather and a backyard barbeque.

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Coconut Chili Lime Cupcakes

Ignore the sloppily-applied shaved coconut decoration

I suspect that I’m feeling fanciful and antsy because…well, probably because I’m an energetic person who has a hard time focusing when I don’t get out DO incredibly active things every day.  I suspect this is why bicycle commuting works so well for me.

That’s really neither here nor there; what’s actually relevant is that I wanted to do something unexpected.  I had been planning to make Chili Chocolate, and then I realized that would be very similar to Mels’ Mexican Hot Chocolate Cupcakes, and somehow that ended with me telling everything within IMing distance that I was going to make Coconut Chili Lime Cupcakes.

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