Carrot Cupcakes With Citrus Glaze

RECIPE TRIAL
I made an exciting discovery last week. I ventured to the garden to see what was greening up. I sat down for a moment and noticed orange little caps poking through the dirt.

I had been sure that the jack rabbits and deer had dug up my remaining carrots during the winter months. But lo and behold as I started digging up came handfuls of carrots.

Now that is some kind of beautiful surprise on a March morning. Well I thought these carrots deserved some special treatment and they became carrot cupcakes Sunday evening.

My 10 year old daughter loves carrot cake. I love cupcakes. Time to find a good cupcake recipe.

I found this relatively easy recipe at Epicurious and their orange glaze promised to be edible for my lactose intolerant 6 year old. Seemed perfect. I made some minor changes to the cupcakes. ( I replaced some of the oil with applesauce).

The gals and I got busy making cupcakes. I do love cooking with my girls.

The cupcakes were moist and tasty although without their glaze they seem more like muffins. I could have gone for a little more sugar, I admit it. Still, I have eaten 3 or 4 so they are tasty. I will grate the carrots more finely next time. The recipe calls for a coarse grate and I prefer a finer grating. Original Recipe here

However, the glaze was really the amazing part of these cupcakes. Absolutely finger licking good. We changed the original recipe just a bit too. We used both lemon juice and orange juice in our frosting. It was bursting with citrus brightness.

Cupcake Recipe

• 2 Cups of grated carrots
• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1/4 teaspoon grated nutmeg
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 1/4 cup applesauce
• 3 large eggs
• 1 cup packed light brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Icing Recipe

• 1 1/4 cups confectioners sugar
• 1 teaspoon grated orange zest
• 2 to 3 tablespoons fresh orange juice
• 1 to 2 Tb lemon juice. (more if needed)

Make cupcakes:
Preheat oven to 350°F with rack in middle. Line muffin cups with paper liners.

Grate enough carrots to measure 2 cups.

Whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg in a bowl.

Whisk together oil, eggs, brown sugar, grated carrots, and vanilla in a large bowl, then stir in flour mixture until just combined.

Divide batter among muffin cups (about 3/4 full) and bake until golden and a wooden pick inserted into center of a cupcake comes out clean, 20 to 25 minutes.

Cool in pan on a rack 10 minutes. Remove cupcakes from pan and cool completely on rack, about 1 hour.

Make icing:
Sift confectioners sugar into a bowl. Whisk in zest and 2 tablespoons orange juice and 1 TB lemon juice until smooth. If icing is too thick, add more juice, 1 teaspoon at a time. Dip top of each cupcake into icing, letting excess drip off (because that just adds to the sticky goodness) and let icing set, about 15 minutes. 

Makes 12 to 15 Cupcakes

Eat for dessert, snack or breakfast

Lime Yogurt Cake

I love St. Paddy's day and every year I usher in spring with a St. Paddy's day lunch for some girl friends and family. I almost skipped it this year. I have been so busy. At the last minute I decided I needed to be with my girls. I am so grateful I kept this yearly date. It was a blast. We giggled, ate and dreamed of green. (We are a little sick of the white stuff here in Southern Utah.)

I served up my typical fare, Chicken Pesto Alfredo, salad and yummy bread but I changed up the dessert to include this Lime Yogurt Cake with lime sherbet and hot fudge sauce. It was refreshingly decadent and surprising. I actually got the recipe for Lemon Yogurt Cake from the "All You" magazine but I decided to give it a little kick by changing a few of the ingredients.

This cake was so easy to make. And while it plays to the green theme, it also has ambitions to be used as a spring dessert in homes everywhere. Give it a try and don't forget to top it with some lime sherbet and hot fudge sauce (preferably dark chocolate).

1 1/2 Cups all-purpose flour
3 TB cornmeal
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp poppy seeds
3/4 Cup sugar
1/4 Cup lime juice
3/4 Cup lowfat lime yogurt
1/3 Cup vegetable oil
1 large egg
1/2 tsp vanilla

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9x5 loaf pan.  Mix together flour, cornmeal, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Mix in poppy seeds. In a separate bowl whisk, sugar, lime juice, yogurt, egg, and vanilla. Stir flour mixture into yogurt mixture. until just combined.

Pour batter into pan and bake for 45 to 50 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Let cool in pan on wire rack for ten minutes. Then remove from pan and let cool completely. Top with a scoop of lime sherbet and hot fudge sauce.

Spider Birthday Cake

Gasp! I have only done two posts for October. I am embarrassed. And I promise I have some good posts coming. Today I am giving you something simple and fun. My daughter asked for a spider cake for her birthday. Let's just say, if we counted handicaps in the cooking world like they do in the golf world, cakes would be my handicap. I have issues with cakes. But this year I am reaching outside my comfort zone and decorating them myself. Now I think this spider cake was a perfect October themed cake and I thought it would be a fun idea for all you love to bake cakes people. I think it came off pretty decent, considering my cake issues. However, let it be known that the first cake I baked, I burned and it didn't come out of the pan in one piece. Which is why I think it is a really, really good idea to stock up on cake mixes when they are on sale. Just in case you have to re bake a cake at 10:30 at night. Here is how this spider cake came about. Please keep in mind that we baked the cake the night before so I could freeze it and I decorated it in time to let it defrost entirely. While this cake was simple to make it does take some planning.

You will need:

1 boxed cake mix

eggs (depends on your mix)

oil

2 Cups chocolate frosting

1 Cup accent color frosting

skittles

candy corns

8 long thin black licorice ropes

Bake cake according to directions. I used a glass pampered chef 8-cup measuring bowl for the cake body. A bundt pan would also be cute for the spider.

When finished baking, run a knife between the pan and the cake to loosen the sides. Let cake cool in pan for 15 minutes. Remove carefully from the pan and place on a plate or platter. Cover with plastic wrap and freeze. Freezing the cake eases the frosting process. You don't end up with crumbs breaking off with the frosting.

Remove frozen cake and put a thin layer of frosting on cake.

Next use a cake decorating tip with a manual cake decorating bag or pump. I used the 8 pronged tip for the furry spider effect and cover your cake. I accented the cake with the pink frosting (it needed to be a little girly) Make small holes in cake (Your cake will probably still be mostly frozen) where you want your spider legs and place licorice ends in top of cake. A chopstick end makes perfect sized holes for skinny licorice legs. Drape down to plate. Use skittles for eyes and border spider with candy corns. We also used the candy corns as spider feet.

Have Fun. I am positive you can improve on this decorating, absolutely positive.

Chocolate Zuchinni Cake with Berry Cream Cheese Glaze

NOTE: For those of you who have already looked at this recipe, I did make a change to the frosting recipe. I reduced the butter.

I totally blew my calorie count today. I could not stop snacking on this moist, chocolate cake -- definitely the best way to eat zucchini, or at least one of the best ways. I also really love ratatouille. I topped off this with my own frosting/glaze adaptation and it has just the right amount of berry flavor, even if it is not doing my hips any favors. I think that pink and brown combo is so chic. I almost did not want to cut into this beauty. But I knew chocolate was waiting. And now straight to the recipe because I promised some friends - desperate to use up their zucchini -- that I would post this recipe today.

Cake

1/2 Cup butter (room temperature)

1/2 Cup oil

1 3/4 Cup sugar

2 Eggs

2 C grated zucchini

1 tsp salt

1 tsp baking soda

2 1/2 Cups flour

1 tsp vanilla

1/2 Cup buttermilk or sour milk

4 Tbsp Cocoa powder

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp baking powder.

1/2 to 1 Cup chocolate chips

Cream butter, oil and sugar until smooth. Add eggs, vanilla and milk. Add remaining ingredients, except chocolate chips. Mix well and stir in 1/2 of the chocolate chips.

Oil and flour a 9x12 pan or a bundt pan. I sprinkled the remaining choco chips on the bottom of the bundt pan. If using a normal cake pan sprinkle top with remaining choco chips.

Bake at 350 degrees for 40 to 45 minutes. Let cool before removing from pan. Pour or spread on frosting. Recipe follows.

Berry Cream Cheese Frosting

4 oz cream cheese softened

1 Cup powdered sugar

1/4 Cup butter

1 Tb berry jam ( I used my triple berry jam)

1 Tb water

Combine cream cheese, powdered sugar and butter and cream together. Mix jam and water and heat in microwave for 20 seconds. Stir and pour into creamed mixture. Beat until well combined. Pour over cake.