Living-Deliberately.com

I was recently in Knoxville and saw this sign in a few places. This particular billboard is in the center of the city, not far from Magpies‘, where I get truly fantastic mini-cupcakes (which, btw, to those of you following my cupcake baking exploits, have completely spoiled my desire to make them at home. Peg’s are just toooo good!).

But anyway, my friend and fellow cupcake-conspirator were in the city getting our afternoon fix of mini Red Velvets when he pointed out this sign to me and my stomach did an involuntary turn from happy bliss to utter revolt-ion.

ARE THEY SERIOUS???? This sign is so tremendously offensive on so many levels. My first thought was how it actually came to be. I mean, step-by-step, this revolting concept had to hit a lot of desks before I saw it in the city. No doubt many minds considered this particular Ripley’s gimmick, graphic design, presentation, from the exhibit designer right on down to the guy who put the sign paper up.  DID NOBODY CHECK THEIR SENSITIVITY CHIP???

Who’s grand idea was it to include a premature infant in this picture? Does anyone really believe that there are actual incubated human babies in the Ripley’s Museum? And next, who (and praytell was it the same creep as the first “genius”) decided it would be a good, rational design choice to juxtapose it with a LIZARD? What parallel are they drawing, and thus wanting us to also draw?

Ripley’s makes it’s money on the “freakish” element of it’s exhibits. I get that. So…are they saying that an incubated baby is a freak? A side show?

Added to the “What the Bleep Were They Thinking?” element is the fact that this sign is only a few miles from a Children’s Hospital. Parents needing to go through town will see it. Parents with little tiny lives they love dearly in those very incubators.

It’s disgusting. Ripley’s is the kind of place I may have taken my “gross-out” loving kiddos. But those same kiddos had a sister who spent her life in a Children’s Hospital. Another one of them has been in and out frequently. I want to raise children who are AWARE of and COMPASSIONATE to the quiet, often invisible, dramas going on behind those hospital walls, being saved by the kind of science Ripley’s is poking fun at.

Because if their intention was to display the “marvels” of medical science and what it can do, they certainly didn’t communicate it with this billboard. Equating infants with reptiles and presenting it all as something to be gawked at is repulsive. Which, is what I am: Repulsed right out of ever going there.

My favorite kind of place? Comfortable and decorated with wi-fi and lots of friendly faces streaming in. We had our live kick-off for theworldsbiggestblogparty in just such a place. The coffee is strong and plentiful (you can opt for a washable mug and refill as much as you like) and every time the door opens, someone who loves the place walks in. There is art all over the walls because the owner is also an artist and it’s his gallery space. It’s great.

So’s my little cupcake! I made up my cake recipe: it’s COFFEE. And the frosting for this one is chocolate almond but it needs something more like the Mascapone filling in Tiramsu. I’ll be experimenting further with that.

This cupcake was created in thought of a great friend made in just that coffee shop. Cupcakes, friends, and Coffee. Can it get any better than that?

Coffee Cupcakes:

Mix the dry:

2 c. cane or turbinado sugar

2 1/2 c. flour

1 t. salt

1 1/2 t. baking powder

1 1/2 t. baking soda

1/2 t. cinnamon

Mix the wet and blend into the dry:

1 stick of butter, melted

1 c. buttermilk

1 T. vanilla

2 eggs

Mix until fully moistened and stir in 1 c. of very strong, very hot coffee.

Ladel into cupcake papers. Bake at 350 until knife comes out clean.

I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve tried to find THE perfect chocolate cake recipe.

My old stand-by used to be the one on the back of the Hershey’s cocoa box. And indeed the thing is heavenly…as long as it sits overnight first to “ripen”. It’s even better refridgerated…it’s dense, moist, rich, dark…everything a chocolate cake should be. Unfortunately, fresh from the oven, it always tastes a little like fish.

Blech. Many a cake baker I’ve talked to has said they didn’t like the Hershey’s version. Every time they said that it turned out they’d eaten the thing within a couple of hours out of the oven. No-can-do.

So you all have seen the different recipes I’ve tried. A cupcake is something that SHOULD be eaten fresh…around here the birdies start circling as soon as the frosting is on, which happens as soon as the ditties are cool enough for it not to slide off. There was the “My Dad Loves Me” german chocolate attempt, the disasterously dry rasperry-devil’s food which was so nasty it didn’t even get named, the outstanding yet gentle cocoa version in “Bought New Shoes That Fit and Got Somewhere To Go” cupcakes. I was still on the hunt for a good DARK chocolate cake recipe and was beginning to consider resorting to a box mix, doctored up.

But something happens when you read every recipe that comes your way: the method starts to sink in. And like any other art form, once the method is mastered, true freedom to divert from it is found. It began to dawn on me how I could tweak one enough to get my desired result. I think there are many variations of my recipe out there and I know that this is the one that works for me. I’m sold!

Today’s result is “There’s no place like home” cupcakes. The cake is light, dark, moist, great fresh from the oven and chilled for later. The frosting is dark, almost bittersweet. I didn’t cook the frosting this time; I wanted something stiffer. Together with a glass of milk, the quintessential chocolate/chocolate-washed-down-with-cold-and-creamy Americana dessert is achieved.

With a week of travel, months of gypsie living that won’t end anytime soon, and a life that is ever-complicated it’s good to remember that there really is “no place like home”. It’s warm and comforting, nourishing in soul, spirit, and body.  The best is usually simple, unpretentious, and excellent in it’s own quiet way. We return to it time and time again and the real thing is never as good as an imitation.

So this cupcake is like home… it’s no hotel, grocery store lard cake with a pyramid of lardy frosting on top. It’s not a bakery beauty or a wedding specialty. Just a humble, deliberately simple, quietly rich hug.

Tia’s Dark Chocolate Cupcake Recipe:

mix the dry first:

1 3/4 c. Turbinado sugar

1 3/4 c. all purpose flour

3/4 c. cocoa

1 1/2 t. baking powder

1 1/2 t. baking soda

1 t. salt

Separately, mix wet:

1 stick butter, soft and partially melted

2 eggs

1 c. whole buttermilk

2 t. vanilla extract

Combine all until moist. Whisk in 1 c. very hot, strong black coffee.  Mix at medium speed 2 minutes (I mix this all by hand; it’s about 200 strokes).

The batter will be very runny. Ladel into cupcake papers. Bake at 350 until the knife comes out clean.

Dark Chocolate Buttercream Frosting

(especially good for those who like their chocolate with a high cocoa percentage)

Melt a 4 oz. bar of unsweetened Ghiradelli chocolate

mix into it:

2T. hot coffee

1 1/2 t. vanilla

set aside and beat until fluffy:

2/3 c. butter

mix in 2 cups powdered sugar and 1/3 c. milk, alternating

add chocolate mixture until smooth.

The recent run down:

These started out as “He Never Brought Me Flowers Anyway” cupcakes but weren’t bittersweet enough in the end. They are instead, “My Dad Loves Me Cupcakes”. He loves carmely-nutty-goo :-).

We used silicon heart cups for them. I didn’t like these so much… the bottoms are sure-enough heart shaped but the tops are round. I did some with white papers as well and still like these for their simplicity best.

This sunday’s experiment involved dark chocolate and raspberries….pretty classic. I made a devil’s food cupcake, topped with a raspberry syrup made from fresh berries, and a chocolate Italian whipped buttercream frosting.

CRITICAL ERROR….using raspberry extract in the frosting. ICK. I have been away from artificial flavors for long enough so that I can’t tolerate them now. The only way to get REAL raspberry flavor is from a real berry. This attempt with the fake stuff just ruined the whole batch of frosting and drove me to scrape clean the top of my cake before eating it. And to wit….the dumb cake was DRY too. All in all, not so great a batch this time.

Remember last week when I said I wanted to find a frosting recipe that used lots less refined sugar????

I found the secret! And the answer is: Italian Buttercream Frosting!

It’s cooked. It’s merange. It only takes a 1/2 c. sugar, and it’s FANTASTIC.

But first, the cake! I tried a sour cream chocolate cake recipe that was not the dark fudgy thing I’m still on the hunt for, but WAS, light, cocoa-y, and while I can’t describe it, turns out to taste exactly like a fascinating chocolate cake I first had 13 years ago. It has melted unsweet chocolate in it…. I think it could still be a touch moister but what I had there was the best cake I’ve had in years and years. I used Turbinado sugar (will try brown next time), and cake flour. I might also add some buttermilk next time for moisture.
They became the base for the chocolate buttercream frosting I made, my first effort at a cooked version. It was egg white, sugar, and vanilla, beaten over a double boiler until frothy and soft-peak stage. Then, mixed with the stand mixer for 5 minutes until fluffy. Added to that was the melted chocolate and the butter, cut into little cubes. I should have known the Italians would have gotten this right!

The result? Chocolate clouds.

Chilled, these little cupcakes had my eyes closed and each bite slowly savored. No overwhelming sweet assault and somehow a nourished-comfort feeling of childhood was close by.

So, like my grandma used to say, are these, “Hang Your Head Over The Sink When You Eat That Cupcakes”? Or, like Mom thought, maybe, “Just Bought New Shoes That Fit And I’ve Got Somewhere To Wear Them Cupcakes”?, Or, “Best Eaten Alone After Day Is Done Cupcakes”?

We are undecided. We are glad though, that this batch is gone, so that our temptation is now lessened. For a Chocolate Cake/Chocolate Frosting combination, there will never be another.

These little ditties are so happy!

I started with a sourcream coffee cake recipe with a lemon flavor. Ironically, commenter Cathy in Jax left a note, almost simultaneously, to try sour cream in the cake. And brava!! It does indeed make for a much nicer texture. I can hardly wait to try it in chocolate….I’ve got an idea for a milk chcolate concoction, “Dream Come True In the Back Seat” cupcake. I’ve decided to name my cakes like the pies in the movie Waitress. Fun! :-).

So I ladeled in the batter and added a dwollup of raspberry jam. During cooking, it looked like the jam stayed at the top of the cake but as we later found out, it actually sank to the bottom. The frosting had to be done twice, after I found out the hard way how nasty “rose” food coloring can look and how grainy butter cream that has had a skimped-upon amount of sugar added can be. YUCK. Though I do pine and long for a frosting that has the same texture as a fluffy buttercream with much less refined sugar…..

I started over with a fresh batch, raspberry extract, and a prettier pink for coloring. The result is a very springy, happy cake…all but that jam center. It really is overkill. This cupcake is sweet and light tasting in a decadent sort of way and the jam just gets in the way. Texture Conflict or something. Maybe like frizzy hair and rainy days….

Well done this could be the “Great Hair Day Cupcake”. A little tweaking and thus it shall be named.

Yesterday I continued the search for the perfect chocolate cake…I tried a recipe that used melted unsweetened chocolate instead of cocoa powder. I divided the batter into halves so I could try two of my dreamed-of cupcakes, Chocolate Mint and peanut butter cup.

They baked beautifully. I pushed a Reece’s miniature into the center of all the peanut butter ones and I used peppermint extract in the batter of the mint side. Then I gathered a new chocolate butter cream frosting recipe and divided that in half as well. Half got more mint extract and the other half, a cup of creamy peanut butter.

At the store I’d found some valentine York peppermint patties that sunk nicely into the mint cupcakes. I had planned to chop Goobers, chocolate covered peanuts, over the peanut butter ones but I instead went with chopped Reece’s cups, on my Dad’s recommendation that I should “keep things soft”.

The result? I think they are pretty, though I’m not sure I have them decadent/fancy enough….the cake was DRY so I’m still not there on that recipe. The frosting was FANTASTIC and I’ll definitely stick with it. It wasn’t too sweet, was very chocolaty, spread well, and kept it’s shape without getting hard.

Next up….I think lemon and raspberries…..

Sunday afternoons are becoming “cupcake experiment” days. I have visions of liquors and cream cheese insides with ganache toppings, fruity little chocolate conconctions that entice one to take one and hide in the closet while eating it, away from many small and interested children…..

Today’s foray was into something I dreamed about: Malted Milk Ball Cupcakes. I wanted a chocolate cupcake with a creamy malt butter cream frosting (not too sweet though) and topped with a whopper candy.

I got my chocolate cupcake recipe online again, though it was absolutely not chocolaty enough. I think I may try a chocolate pound cake next time. I want it to taste like CHOCOLATE…not just a sorta-cocoa-sweet-cake. That’s what this one tasted like…too sweet, not chocolate enough. Maybe the difference is in using melted chocolate rather than cocoa powder?

I mixed the whole thing by hand again, doing my “200 strokes” and she’s right…doing things the long way sometimes can be quite zen. (BTW…check out her great header; someone painted that and I think it’s groovy.)

For the frosting, I used butter, cream, powdered sugar, and malt powder. The result was not stiff enough and definitely toooooo sweet. I topped them with a whopper and more crushed whoppers.

The result? Cute and sweet.

I think next time I’ll try a malted cupcake with a dark chocolate frosting, topped with crushed whoppers. This result fell short of how they tasted in my dream ;-). Oh, and I didn’t take this with a sepia setting but it kinda looks like that ‘eh?

I’ve been “reading” this blog the last few days…okay, confession: not reading, just scanning it for the beautiful and indulgent cupcake photography. I’m not headed to the kitchen to make any of these but I do sit and pout that there is not a similar bakery anywhere near me offering these tidbits.

And lest anyone take from the title any nasty little thoughts, the shots on the blog include only fluffy frosting, dainty cakes, and bodacious toppings that fun to look upon, will make you salivate to taste, and stop the car the next time you pass a bakery.

I have noticed recently a little popularity trend regarding cupcakes….Katie Holmes has been quoted often about her love of cupcakes, even buying them for the whole crew on one of her movies. Katie Holmes being who she is of course, Mrs. Tom Cruise, she has egads of followers and so the little cupcake now reguarly makes appearances in the celebrity tabloid magazines (yes, I read them). Earlier this year I went to a friend’s beach house and in a white bakery box was a selection of truly gourmet cupcakes…these were not the yellow and white nasties offered in grocery stores, with their pyramids of shortening-and-sugar gloppy frosting and preservative-laden day old cake bases. Each one was a tribute to some larger version of itself…a whole cake…and someone had taken great care to make each one a miniature masterpiece. My friends there cut them in pieces so we could each savor the different flavors…these were not for inhaling and wiping one’s mouth on the back of our sleeves!

Even the word, “cupcake” is sweet. Sweet enough to become a woman’s nickname, a term of endearment. It’s got to be one of the smiliest desserts…”cheesecake” sounds rich, “pie” sounds homey, “creme brulee” sounds difficult. But say “cupcake” and I think of yellow and white gingham, aprons, freckles, picnics, kisses that make noses bump and faces giggle…

Maybe cupcakes in their tiny simplicity and bliss is sort of the antithesis of where I “am” right now. And maybe that’s exactly the reason I woke up today wanting one…specifically, a chocolate one with chocolate frosting…real, cocoa-y, buttery. Uh, I also wanted it served with a margarita for breakfast, which is also probably a symptom of where I am right now, but nevermindthat.

Cupcakes’ renewed popularity has worked to it’s favor. There are now blogs devoted to cupcakes, their history, recipes, photos, and frosting choices. Websites offering them for weddings (my friend recenly had beautiful cupcakes at his wedding), birthdays, graduations…major events that used to, without hesitation, use full-sized cakes. And no longer is your cupcake choice to take a box cake mix and just choose the muffin tin option…recipes are designed to make them from scratch with ease.

I found a yellow buttermilk cupcake recipe that we had all the ingredients for, and a cream cheese chocolate frosting recipe I thought I’d give a try. Unlike my usual “dump it all in the mixer and go” style for baking/cooking/loading my van, I decided to be more ritualistic about it today. I measured. And, I mixed my dry separately and my liquids in another bowl. Wait, wait…it gets better! I also skipped the elecric mixer and put in my “200 strokes by hand”.

Okay, forgive the enthusiasm. I watched Waitress this week, a FANTASTIC movie that sometimes hit a little too close to home, I didn’t want to see end, and included pie making scenes that would drive any woman to the kitchen to make food with deliberate joy. Watch it…you won’t be sorry.

So anyway, back to the cupcakes. I halved the recipe I found because we don’t need to overeat to enjoy baking, and they rose beautifully and quickly. They cooled quickly too. I think the whole mix-to-bake-to cool and frost took under 45 minutes for 1 dozen cupcakes.

To frost them, I swirled them upside down in the bowl. I’ve kind of always wanted to do that, having seen it on a cooking show about 15 years ago. It worked pretty well. I got even coverage, with only a few dabs with the spatula needed here and there. To that I added sprinkles and a little flower.

The result was yummy but could have been better. The cream cheese in the frosting competes with the buttermilk in the cake too much; a pure cocoa frosting would have been a better choice. The cake itself was soft and I had more than one creative idea strike me while I was working with them.

Favorite tip: use a ladle to scoop batter into your papers. Zero mess.

Here’s the recipe I used:

Buttermilk Cupcakes:

makes 12

2c. flour

1 t. baking powder

1 t. baking soda

3/4 t. salt

1 c. sugar

1 c. butter, softened

1 t. vanilla

2 eggs

1c. buttermilk

Mix dry. Mix wet. Blend. pour. bake at 350.

Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting:

makes enough to modestly frost 12 cupcakes, plus have some left for dipping pretzles into later!

1/2 stick butter, softened

1/2 block cream cheese, softened

about a cup of powdered sugar

about 1/2 cup of cocoa (okay, I didn’t measure that part; add in intervals and taste till you’re happy)