TASTE
Baking cupcakes at home a fun family activity
| • | Crowning cupcakes |
By Wanda A. Adams
Advertiser Food Editor
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The folks at Hokulani Bake Shop at Restaurant Row — who helped us with tips on cupcake baking and photos for this story — of course hope you'll buy all your cupcakes there, but if you're up for a baking day in your own kitchen, here are a couple of different recipes.
The following recipe, which uses oil instead of butter, is meant to be a family project, designed to go together quickly ("before the kids get impatient"). You can assign different children different tasks to make it fun for all: one measures, one mixes, one lines the cupcake tin, another fills the cupcake liners. This recipe is from "The Cupcake Deck," by Elinor Klivans, a clever little box of recipe cards, beautifully photographed.
KID-SIMPLE CUPCAKES
For the cupcakes:
For the frosting:
Place an oven rack in the middle position in the oven and heat oven to 350 degrees. Line a muffin tin with paper liners. (Or, if you don't have a muffin tin, you can use foil liners, which, placed on a cookie sheet, will hold their shape during baking.)
Sift the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt into a medium bowl and set aside. In the bowl of an electric mixer on medium speed, beat the egg, egg yolk and sugar together until thickened and lightened, about 2 minutes. Stop the mixer and scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed. On low speed, mix in the oil and the vanilla. Stir in the sour cream, mixing until no white streaks remain. Add the flour mixture until the batter is smooth.
Fill each muffin liner with a scant 1/4 cup of batter, to about 1/2 inch from the top. Bake at 350 degrees until the top feels firm and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, about 23 minutes. Cool on a wire rack. Do not frost cupcakes until they're fully cooled.
Meanwhile, make the frosting: In a large bowl, using an electric mixer on low speed, beat the butter, powered sugar and vanilla together with 3 tablespoons milk. Add up to 1 tablespoon more milk, as needing to achieve the desired spreading consistency. You can add a drop or two of food coloring, if desired. Spread or pipe about 2 1/2 tablespoons of frosting over each cupcake.
Makes 12 cupcakes.
Options: Flavor frosting with 1/2 teaspoon almond extract or 1 teaspoon grated lemon or orange zest. You can also divide the frosting and use different shades of food coloring, then mix, match and decorate.
This recipe, from "Baking Illustrated," by the editors of Cook's Illustrated magazine and the America's Test Kitchen TV show, takes a little bit of a different approach from the usual. Instead of creaming the butter and sugar, then adding the dry and liquid ingredients alternately, pretty much everything gets mixed together all at once. It comes with a super-simple frosting idea.
YELLOW CUPCAKES WITH SIMPLE CHOCOLATE FROSTING
For the frosting:
For the cupcakes:
On the stove, bring the cream to a simmer in a small saucepan (or you can do this in the microwave). Place the chocolate in a medium bowl and pour the hot cream over it. Cover the bowl with foil and let it stand 5 minutes. Whisk the mixture until smooth, then cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate until cool and slightly firm, 45 minutes to 1 hour.
Meanwhile, place an oven rack in the middle position in the oven and heat oven to 350 degrees. Line a muffin tin with paper liners. (Or, you don't have a muffin tin, you can use foil liners, which, placed on a cookie sheet, will hold their shape during baking.)
In the bowl of a standing mixer, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Add the butter, sour cream, egg, yolks and vanilla and beat the wet ingredients into the dry at medium speed, until smooth and satiny, about 30 seconds. Scrape down the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula and stir until smooth and no flour pockets remain.
Divide the batter evenly among the muffin cups, using a 2-ounce ice cream scoop. Bake at 350 degrees until the tops are pale gold and a toothpick or skewer inserted in the center comes out clean, 20 to 24 minutes. Transfer cupcakes to a wire rack to cool; cool to room temperature before frosting, about 45 minutes.
Top with 2 to 3 generous tablespoons of frosting and let the kids go wild with sprinkles, colored sugar, nonpareils, candies or finely chopped chocolate.
Makes 1 dozen cupcakes.
Reach Wanda A. Adams at wadams@honoluluadvertiser.com.
