Flavours of the Week!

I won't lie. I haven't been much motivated for blogging. I made some cupcakes. Two different kinds in fact. Over Easter, I was given an abundance of dark chocolate. There was no way I could possibly eat all of it. So I decided to make something with it.
Before that I had a mango. Mmm, mango. Not everyone is a fan of mango's but I think that's just ridiculous.
I wanted to make mango cupcakes. Initially I wanted to make flan for the topping but that's proving slightly more difficult than I could have imagined. Flan is such a beautiful dish. Made so many different ways but the people of Puerto Rico do it best. :)

Since I didn't make the flan topping, I decided to make a caramel buttercream. I also made a decision to fill all of my cupcakes with some sort of magical filling. So I decided these bad boys will be laced with a combination of caramel and mango cream cheese.
I started making the mango cupcakes. I adapted this recipe. I used an extra 3/4th cup of mango because I really love wanted to taste the mango. So all in all it would have been 1.5 cups of mango puree. I didn't use the ginger and I added 1/8th of a teaspoon extra of baking powder.

For the filling

I used:

8oz of cream cheese
1/2 cup of mango puree
1/2 cup of caramel sauce
1/2 teaspoon of vanilla extract

For the caramel buttercream

I used:

• 113g of unsalted butter (1 stick)

• pinch of salt

• 2 1/2 cups powdered sugar (icing sugar)

• mango and caramel sauce to taste :)

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I went to Birmingham a bit ago and saw my old friends from when I used to live there. Obviously I found myself wondering what I was going to bring with me. Aside from the usual bottles of wine. There was no way I'm going anywhere without baking cupcakes for my friends :D
So all that dark chocolate I got for Easter. I decided to make dark chocolate ganache as the filling for my orange cupcakes! :)


I adapted this cupcake recipe from Food and Drink.


Orange Cupcakes

• 2 eggs

• 1/2 cup (125 ml) unsalted butter, softened

• 1 cup (250 ml) granulated sugar

• 1/2 teaspoon (2 ml) pure vanilla extract

• 2 cups (500 ml) sifted before measured cake and pastry flour

• 2 teaspoons (10 ml) baking powder

• 1/4 teaspoon (1 ml) salt

• 1/2 cup (125 ml) milk

• 1/4 cup (50 ml) orange juice

• 1 tablespoon (15 ml) orange zest

NOTE: I ended up switching the measurements of the milk & orange juice. So it will be 1/2 cup Orange Juice & 1/4 cup milk
I also used fresh orange juice instead of the concentrated stuff.


1. Preheat oven to 375° (190° C)
2. Line 12 muffin tin cups with paper or silicone liners. Place eggs in a small bowl; cover with hot tap water. (You only need to do this if you're eggs have been in the fridge)
3. Beat butter with sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs 1 at a time; then vanilla. Thoroughly mix sifted flour with baking powder and salt. Then sift or rub through a sieve again. Combine milk with orange juice.
4. Alternately, in 2 batches, stir first flour mixture and then milk mixture into butter mixture. Stir in zest. Divide batter among cups.
5. Bake in oven centre for 18 to 20 minutes or until light golden and a cake tester into middle of cupcake comes out clean. Cool on rack.








Orange Cupcakes filled with Dark Chocolate Ganache & Topped with Orange-Chocolate buttercream



To make the orange chocolate buttercream


I used:

• 113g Unsalted Butter (1 stick)

• A Pinch of Salt

• 2 1/2 Cups of Powdered Sugar (icing sugar)

• 3 Tbsp Fresh Orange Juice

• 1 Tbsp Unsweetened Cocoa Poweder

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I am sorry that I took so long to post anything up. I will do my extra best to not fail any of my 9 followers again!


With lots and love, till next time my sugar babies.!




Ruthless
Bakery

Ahoy London!

Wow! :) What a treat!
What does 150 cupcakes look like?!

Let's start with these shall we.

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It took me two days to bake and decorate 150 cupcakes. It would be have been easier to have had an extra hand but I find that if you want things done perfectly, you'll have to do them yourself.
However, I am looking forward to having help in the future. I just need to find the perfect partner to bake and decorate with! He or she would have to be considerably eccentric, kind of like myself. :)

Wednesday I started baking the first 75 cupcakes. I think next time I will bake the entire order 2 days before hand and then decorate the next day. It was a lovely challenge. One that will get easier every time.
My friend Chrissie works at Last.fm and asked if I would bake 150 cupcakes for a client of hers. So she asked for red- I thought perfect red... mmm red.. Ohh red velvet! Perfect timing as well. I asked my friend James back home in New York to send me some lovely American goodness. Things you can't find here. Things that I love. Like Twinkies, and lots of Spanish seasoning. I also asked for Hershey's unsweetened cocoa powder and coconut extract! Those are perfect things for red velvet.
The coconut extract was used for the buttercream. There really isn't anything like coconut and chocolate.



Red Velvet





150 cupcakes, dressed and ready for travel! :)

I had 6 boxes, each holding 25 cupcakes a piece. Getting them to London in one piece was a mission on it's own. I really do enjoy high tense situations. I booked a table seat on the train but I didn't book in time. The train was packed with Man United and City fans. Luckily for me it wasn't so rowdy and nobody placed their luggage on top of my wonderfully decorated cupcakes.
The boxes I stored them in resembled fancy pizza boxes.

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We all finally made it to London in one piece. Me and and my army of cupcakes. London Euston was packed. Filled with that intensity you get off people who are rushing from train to train and tourist who can't seem to make up their minds on where to go. The weather was nice. Sunny and mostly warm. I sat waiting for my friend Chrissie to come and get me. I had to use the bathroom so bad but I kept myself busy with my new book. Finally the madam arrived and I let her man the cupcakes till I returned. There we go on our way to the lego building, in central London. The building is called this because of the bright orange colour that it's dressed in. The inside reminded me of something out of the Fifth Element. The outside of the elevators has no buttons to press, nor the inside. It was quite clever actually.

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A success!

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After the cupcake drop off, Chrissie and I set off to have food, drinks & well over-due catch up. We laughed and drank delicious cocktails and then trolled around the streets of SoHo- We ended up at Nordic Bar and drank more deliciousness. James the barman cocked up some lovely drinks and few complimentary shots to boot.


That was something spicy. Chili and something else... lord knows.. but it had a good kick.

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I had a lovely time in London! :)

Thanks Chrissie!


Ruthless
Bakery

3 Treats & Last.fm

Ahoy! I am back again with more greatness as usual. I haven't baked or posted anything for a bit. However I do have loads of mouth watering treats for you-

I decided I wanted to take a small break from cupcakes and make cheesecake. I'm obsessed with this recipe which I've adapted from a cookbook that I live by. Manhattan Cheesecake. Traditionally in America cheesecake is made with graham crackers (biscuits) since moving to the UK, I've had to find something else...
Really I'm not a fan of the crunchy bottom crust you get with most cheesecakes. A lot of them tend to have too much sugar, or not enough butter, or a combination of both. I found that using Hobnobs is so for the win. They are an oat based biscuit and are very delicious. If you can't find that, plain digestives or any other plain biscuit will do. I also used vanilla seeds the recipe doesn't call for that, but I am without a doubt obsessed with vanilla. In my opinion which is pretty much all I have, cheesecake should be baked. If you find any that doesn't require a bake, then it's fake. It won't taste how it should taste. It all honesty it should just melt on your tongue.
The recipe will be posted on my recipe page (when I build one) soon. I promise.

I bet you wanna see photos now...



The recipe calls for blueberries but I went ahead and used blackberries & strawberries.

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I've been aching to make cake pops for a while now, and there really wasn't any excuse not to make them.

What is a cake pop?!
Well I'm glad you asked. Imagine a tiny cupcake covered in any type of melted chocolate with a lollipop stick attached!




I've found that most people use cake mix from a box to make these pops. Not me. I used my vanilla cupcake recipe and I thought well I could put the batter into a 9" pan and roll out "pops" from that or I can use miniature cupcake cases. As you can see, I opted for miniature cupcake cases. I melted white chocolate and plain chocolate. Really you can use any kind of chocolate that you like. Creating white chocolate swirls is a very simple thing to do. My advice when making these. Let the chocolate cool just slightly, once it's all melted remove it from the heat. And when the cakes are done make sure they are cooled completely. The fridge is always a good thing if your in a rush.

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So I after I made those I had some cake batter left over & some strawberries. So what do you think I did? :)
of course... I made some cupcakes. The left over strawberries I used for buttercream frosting.
I honestly just couldn't help myself. I love making/baking/eating cupcakes! :)

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I am very pleased to announce that I am baking quite a large number of cupcakes for Last.fm

My friend has a client moving to a new office and she wants to welcome them to their new home. What a better way to do that than with cupcakes? But not just any cupcakes. Ruthless cupcakes. I've decided to go with my red velvet and coconut buttercream frosting. You all remember those.. Just incase you need a reminder...






That's all for now... stay tuned for more goodness ahead.



Ruthless
Bakery