that's what she baked.

It’s March, and while I’m not making anything Irish themed, I am thinking green with my zucchini cupcakes. I am more behind in my blogging than I would like to be, these (and some upcoming posts) are from a week and a half ago. I made what felt like a gazillion big and little cupcakes for a few different occasions. Sadly, I don’t have any good pictures of them finished (outside of tupperware).

Zucchini cupcakes are definitely a favorite of mine. I’m very happy with how the cream cheese frosting came out, too! I based it off a different recipe than I usually use, and I think I’ve found what I’ve been looking for… I especially was thinking about this when I went to East End Cupcakes (back in February).

Side note referring to the middle picture: I recently redeemed a coupon at an online baking supply store and found myself drawn to buy 500 gingham tiny cupcake liners… because one never knows when they’ll need a surplus of teeny cupcakes for a picnic.

Pumpkin Pecan Chocolate Chip cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting

These (very delayed) birthday cupcakes were made for co-workers last week. Originally, I wanted to make cupcakes for, or close to people’s actual birthdays, but timing and life often doesn’t work out like that. I asked for preferences and both of the teachers said they like almost everything I’ve made, but are partial to cream cheese frosting. I didn’t want to have to go food shopping so I decided to work with what I had in my cabinet. While pumpkin season has passed, I thought I’d use the can now, instead of waiting again for the fall to come. I had toasted pecans from these pies and some chocolate chips hanging around so I thought they’d be great to mix in the pumpkin batter (a Martha Stewart recipe) topped with a creamy cream cheese frosting (also, Martha). I didn’t turn my Kitchen Aid on at all and mixed everything but the frosting, with a whisk and my muscles. 

I was not happy with the fact that I under-filled the cupcake liners, but nobody complained. Whenever I think I know how much to fill, I have a different recipe and it has a different weight and consistency, etc. That’s what’s happening right? I’m not too too worried about it. However, under-filling did give me the opportunity to make some babycakes, which gave me the ability to taste the cakes and share with more friends.  

First Day of School Cupcakes: part 1

Last week I went to an itty bitty farmers market and JP and was happy to see zucchini’s and decided that’s just what I wanted to make for the first day of school. For those of you who don’t know, in real life I’m an art teacher (you can read more about me here), and yesterday was the kids’ first day back so I wanted to make something for my fellow teachers. I used the same zucchini recipe I used for St. Patricks Day + I tried a different cream cheese frosting that I added lemon zest to. 

I made the cupcakes and frosting on Sunday night, starting at 9PM so I decided to wake up early Monday to frost them.

Hello friends! I’ve been out of town for short while, but before I disappeared I made cupcakes as a “thank you ahead of time” to the other teachers for covering my responsibilities while I was away. These pictures are actually from a week ago. I had so much frosting left over from the art show cupcakes but wanted to pair the strawberry cream cheese frosting with a different cake. I was thinking of things that go with strawberries and I thought of strawberry banana smoothies, so I thought I’d make some banana cupcakes. The taste combo was a success. 

Pictured is the cupcakes in the teachers room (it moved recently and we still haven’t finished unpacking). 

Strawberry Cream Cheese Frosting(I topped my strawberry jam babycakes with this)

I didn’t follow an actual recipe, but I’ll just tell you what I did for this delicious, light, and different version of a cream cheese frosting.

Ingredients:

• 12 oz cream cheese, at room temperature
• 6 tbsp unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 3-4 cups confectioners sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract 
• 6 strawberries, diced up and drained (I only had 6 strawberries to work with. Also, you need to try and squeeze as much of the juices as you can out of them, so they don’t make your frosting all goopy)

Directions

Combine the butter, cream cheese and vanilla with an electric mixer, until light and fluffy. Gradually add the confectioners, a little bit at a time, wiping the bowl as necessary. Finally, add the strawberry pieces. I thought about putting them in a food processor, but I kind of wanted bigger strawberry pieces. The coloring is natural, and I love it. Because I only had a few strawberries, the taste wasn’t overwhelming, and I thought it went really well with my cupcakes. 

If you make this frosting, you might want play with measurements. I have a lot of frosting left over, and that’s after decorating 30 tiny cupcakes. It’s in the fridge right now… there’s really a lot leftover and I’m trying to decide what else would be a good cake to top off with strawberry cream cheese frosting?