Baking Tips - Cakes & Cupcakes

In my desire to become a better baker, I've been searching out tips for cakes and cupcakes.  Here are some of the things I found:

• Ingredients should all be measured properly.  Use a glass measuring cup on a level surface for wet ingredients, and use a flat-topped measuring nesting type of measuring cup for dry ingredients, using the flat edge of a knife to level it before you add it to the recipe.
• Sifting flour and sugar can help prevent lumps in your batter.
• Bring cold ingredients (such as butter or eggs) to room temperature before mixing, leaving them out for about an hour before you need to use them.  Butter will incorporate into a batter or dough easier if it's softened, and the whites of warm eggs can actually take on more volume than cold eggs.  Plus, cold eggs could potentially cause the softened butter in dough to become clumpy during the mixing process.  To bring eggs and butter to room temperature quickly, you can put eggs in a container of warm water for about 10 minutes.  Cutting up the butter into small pieces will speed the softening process, especially if you put it on a plate over the container with the eggs.  The warmth from the water will help things move along faster.
• Add ingredients a little at a time, mixing in between each addition.  If you are adding both wet ingredients and dry ingredients, begin and end with the dry, alternating with wet.  You'll achieve a better consistency that way.
• If you're making cupcakes, add batter evenly to all of your cups, filling them 1/2 to 1/3 full, depending upon how much rise you typically get out of that type of batter.  To make sure, you can bake a test cupcake and either add more or less to the remainder of the batch as needed.  A cupcake/cookie scoop or an ice cream scoop can help to achieve even batter in each cup, which will ensure more even baking from one cupcake to the next.
• Most standard-size cupcakes take anywhere from 18 to 25 minutes to bake.  Start checking for doneness at the low end of the suggested baking time.  As a general rule, a toothpick should come out clean when inserted into the center of a cupcake.  You can also press gently on the top of a cupcake.  If it's done, it should bounce back.
• Cool cupcakes for 10 to 15 minutes in the pan, then turn them out onto a baking rack to finish cooling.  Make sure that they are completely cool before they're frosted, or you'll have soft, sometimes even melted frosting as a result.
• You can freeze unfrosted cupcakes for up to 3 months or so.  Thaw them in the refrigerator or out on the counter, then frost them once they're completely thawed.

Behold the Delicious Cupcaky Goodness!

What? What is this? An actual blog post from me? How did that happen?

Actually, with National Blog Posting Month coming up in November, I was intending to get back on the horse and post every day that month, with the hope and intention of continuing to post regularly afterward, even if it's not every day. I did really well with posting every day in November 2009, posted 9 times in December, then slowed to a trickle before I just trailed off to nothing after the beginning of June. I don't want to let that happen again, so I've started an Evernote folder on my iPhone so that I can write down blog topics as I think of them. Although often my problem is not thinking of blog posts (I frequently think "Hey, I should totally blog about that") but making the time to write them down. So I'll be developing more discipline in that area.

Anyway, my reason for jumping back into the fray a few days early is...CUPCAKES. My friend Colleen alerted me to the existence of RestlessChipotle.com's list of the 50 Best Cupcake Recipes on the Internet. Hold the phone! Amazing cupcake recipes all collected in one place? I'm so there.

I've already found 3 on the list I must try, had an idea for a fourth I want to create, and was told by Colleen about another recipe that she insists is incredible, for Martha Stewart's Pumpkin Cupcakes. How cute is this?

Her recipe is just for the cupcake sans frosting, but she recommends you use your favorite sweet cream cheese frosting to top them. I like the one that comes with this recipe for Carrot Cake. In fact, this is my go-to carrot cake recipe, except I omit the pecans and add an 8-oz. can of crushed pineapple. Yum! So moist and delicious. It's a very dense Carrot Cake, so don't expect it to rise much. It will be a fairly flat cake or cupcake on the top.

The first recipe from the top 50 list is Hummingbird Cupcakes:

These contain bananas, pecans, crushed pineapple and coconut and are frosted with a cream cheese frosting. They sound especially perfect for a spring or summer event, but I'm not sure I can wait that long to try them.

The next recipe is for Samoas Cupcakes:

The recipe starts with a Brown Sugar Butter Cupcake. You cut off the top, hollow out the center and fill it with caramel sauce. Replace the top and spread it with a thick layer of coconut topping, then drizzle with caramel and chocolate ganache and sprinkle a little toasted coconut over the top. These are not your optimal choice if you are watching your calories, but don't they sound amazing?!

The third recipe from the top 50 list is for Snickers Cupcakes:

The baker used Hershey's Perfectly Chocolate Cake Recipe, which is one I haven't tried before but will now have to check out. She hollowed out the center and filled it with caramel sauce, then made a caramel buttercream frosting to top the cupcakes. Sprinkle it with chopped up mini-Snickers bars, and you're all set.

Seeing the Snickers Cupcakes inspired me to come up with a recipe for Reese's Peanut Butter Cupcakes. I'm sure others have created recipes for that elsewhere, but I'm going to see what I can come up with to truly make it taste like the flavor of a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup in cupcake form, since often things don't translate with the same flavors when made in a different type of dessert. It seems difficult for people to get the right salty/sweet combination of a Reese's PB Cup in the peanut butter and chocolate they use for recipes. So I'll give it a go and post when I think I've come up with a winning recipe.

There's one more recipe that I found a while back and have been dying to try: Maple Bacon Cupcakes!

It's really hard to go wrong with bacon, and I do like salty and sweet together (like chocolate-covered pretzels). Plus bacon dipped in maple syrup is always delicious. I just don't see how these could turn out to be anything other than fabulous. The cupcakes have maple syrup, bacon drippings and minced cooked bacon inside, and the frosting is maple. Someone is going to be trying these out soon - so if you work with my husband, James, or are in our small group or in choir, or are part of my extended family, there's a good chance you'll be tasting these or one of the other wonderful combinations I'm discovering in the near future.

Consider yourself on notice.