Father's Day Banana Nut Popovers for Pop

If I had to give cupcakes a gender, they would definitely be female.  They dress up in cute liners, add frosting to give themselves some color, and accessorize with sprinkles.  While popovers are also baked in pans with cups, popovers are more like guys - they are who they are, take 'em or leave 'em.

To celebrate some of the most important men in your life, why not make popovers for Pop this Father's Day?  Of course, I wouldn't tell you to make just any popovers.  I created a banana nut popover recipe for Paula Deen that the dad in your life is “pops”itively going to love.  The popovers taste like banana bread crossed with croissants!

Head over to Paula Deen's site to get the popover recipe!

Chocolate Banana Baklava Cupcakes

Take baklava (the middle Eastern dessert featuring buttery phyllo dough, nuts, and sticky sweet honey), add a layer of brownie, mix in some banana chunks, bake in jumbo silicone cupcake liners, and you get chocolate banana baklava cupcakes.  As a baklava fan through and through, I never thought baklava could get any better than the traditional Greek baklava that I order every chance I get.  I was wrong.  Silly me, everything is better with chocolate!  Plus, the banana adds one more surprising and delightful flavor to the mix.

Chocolate banana baklava cupcakes are more labor-intensive than most cupcake recipes that I make.  However, none of the steps are difficult.  If you've got time, you CAN make these and they will be worth every second!

Take a look at a couple more photos and then I'll tell you how to make them. 

Chocolate Peanut Butter Hi-Hat Cupcakes for FilterPure - It's Time to Raise $4,000

Update 8/31/2011: This post does not include the cupcake recipe. I only provided the recipe to those who donated.  Since enough time has gone by, I've made the recipe public on my Chocolate Peanut Butter Hi-Hat Cupcake Recipe post.

These chocolate peanut butter cupcakes loaded with dark chocolate chips, topped with peanut butter frosting, then dipped in more chocolate are a sight to behold.  This is the ultimate chocolate peanut butter cupcake!  Take a look inside:

Want the recipe?  Sorry, it's not free.

Wine and Cheese Cupcakes - Try Them At Your Next Wine Party

Shiraz wine, walnuts, Camembert cheese, and dark chocolate could be wine bar fare at its best. In my cupcake-centric world, however, they are the ingredients in wine and cheese cupcakes.

Serve these wine and cheese cupcakes at your next wine party.  In fact, plan a wine party around them.  These wine and cheese cupcakes are worth it!  Don't be scared by the Camembert.  It's a stinky cheese, for sure, but once it's baked into the cupcakes, your guests won't detect it; they will only note a that these chocolate cupcakes have a sublime sophistication. They are chocolate cupcakes all grown up.

Note:  While it's a common practice to nose wine before drinking it, be careful about nosing the cupcakes.  You may end up with a frosting-covered schnoz.

Apple Pecan Cinnamon Rolls - This Month's Cupcake Project Recipe for Paula Deen

 

As my regular readers know, I create monthly cupcake recipes for PaulaDeen.com.  This month, I was asked to develop something with apples or pecans.  I opted to use both! I made these apple pecan cinnamon roll cupcakes with a glaze that actually contains apple cider! 

Whether or not you make the cinnamon rolls, I'd highly recommend trying out the simple apple cider glaze. The apple cider glaze would be outstanding on my gingersnap cookies.

You'll find both the apple pecan cinnamon roll cupcake recipe and the apple cider glaze recipe on Paula Deen.

Pistachio Oil - Baking With Nut Oils

Pistachio oil is hardly a common pantry staple.  The wall of oils at my local Whole Foods doesn't contain a single bottle of pistachio oil.  I had to track down a bottle of this green gem - and it was worth the effort and the hefty price tag.  While there are many ways to give baked goods a nutty flavor, nut oil - like pistachio oil - may be my new favorite.  But, let's take a look at all of the options:

Charoses Recipe - Mom's Recipe

Charoses is a reason to look forward to Passover. I would eat charoses year round, but then I wouldn't enjoy it as much over Passover. I could eat it by the bowl - cold or hot. Charoses is almost always served cold, but it's actually great after 30 seconds or so in the microwave - try it!

While I typically experiment and drastically change recipes, there is no messin' with Momma's charoses. Well, except for the fact that I used up this charoses in a Kosher for Passover charoses cupcake.

Charoses Recipe

Mom's charoses recipe is actually from The Complete American-Jewish Cookbook. As I look at this digital picture of the cookbook, I can picture the more worn out version of it sitting in Mom's kitchen and feel all warm and fuzzy. If you want your own worn out version, you can get used copies of this book for only $4 on Amazon!

Here is the recipe twice removed from the book - emailed by my mom and then edited with notes by me:

• 1 C chopped apples (Mom uses a couple of different apples to make it
• interesting.)
• 1/4 C chopped nuts (We always use walnuts.)
• 1 t sugar or honey (This is not a choice. Use honey!)
• Grated rind of 1/2 lemon (I ended up using a whole lemon. The more lemon, the merrier.)
• 1/2 t cinnamon or more to taste
  
• 2 tablespoons red wine (about) (Don't go for fancy wine here. You want Manischewitz Concord Grape. I can't imagine charoses with any other wine. It's really an essential ingredient.)

1. Mix all ingredients.
   
2. Add enough wine to bind the mixture.

Nutorious Nut Confections Giveaway

Eat. Walk two steps. Repeat for seven hours.

That was my day at the Fancy Food Show in California. To say it was an amazing experience would be an understatement. The show is held twice a year (one time in San Francisco and one time in New York) and if you can ever make it to one, I highly encourage you to go.

Expect to see several cupcakes here based on products that I discovered at the show - starting with one of the best things I tried there, Nutorious Nut Confections.

I love candied nuts in my salads and have made my own on occasion, but Nutorious takes the candied nut to a new level. I was lucky enough to get to sample the four flavors you see above - not only did I get to try them at the show, but samples were waiting for me when I arrived back in St. Louis!


Check out these descriptions:

• Ooo La La Original - Walnuts, almond, and pecans in a rich buttery confection.
• Cranberry Orange Tango - Walnuts, almonds, pecans, and dried cranberries in a refreshing orange confection.
• Cherry Vanilla Va-Voom - Walnuts, almonds, pecans, and dried and Montmorency cherries in a sweet vanilla confection.
  
• Blueberry Lemon Meringue -Walnuts, almonds, pecans, and dried blueberries in a delicate lemon confection.

I kid you not when I say that I loved all of them. They will all be used to top my salads, pancakes, waffles, and whatever else I can think of - all except for the Cranberry Orange Tango. I used up the whole bag of Cranberry Orange Tango making some delectable cranberry orange cupcakes.

You can look at Nutorious' website to see where it is sold near you. In the meantime, leave a comment letting me know which flavor sounds the best to you and what you would do with it for a chance to win some!

One winner will win all 4 flavors described above and two other winners will win a bag of the Cranberry Orange Tango to use in a cupcake or anything else! The winners will be chosen randomly on the morning of Wed., Feb 4th. You may enter up until the time that I post the winners.

Magic Bullet vs Ordinary Blender: How to Make Nut Butter

Do You Need a Magic Bullet To Make Nut Butters?

I wanted to make some macadamia nut butter for my Vere inspired banana, chocolate, and macadamia nut baby shower cupcakes. Several people told me that the best way to do it was to use a Magic Bullet. Luckily, Groom 2.0 owned a Magic Bullet, so I borrowed it and gave it a go.

What Are You Talking About? What is a Magic Bullet?

Contrary to what the name sounds like, the Magic Bullet is not a vibrator. It is a super intense mini blender/chopper that is featured on late night infomercials. They tell you that it is great for grinding coffee or even making nut butters.

The Magic Bullet Put to the Test

I loaded up 8oz of macadamia nuts into the larger cup of the Magic Bullet. I'd been warned by Groom 2.0 that he had already broken one by blending for too long. "Use short pulses," he said. Clearly, he understands the importance of foreplay. Don't go too strong too fast.

Groom 2.0 also had suggested that I might end up having to use the smaller cup because nuts would get stuck on the side of the big cup and not blend.

I pulsed maybe 10 times or so. Each time, I felt like I was playing a game of Trouble (the one where the dice are in the plastic sphere that you press to make them roll). The Magic Bullet has no on/off switch - you just press the bullet to make it go. Awww, yeah.

The nuts did, in fact, get stuck to the sides. There are no problems with nuts when using a vibrator.

I moved some of the nuts to the smaller cup and pulsed some more. I had to keep pulsing and then shaking the nuts off the sides.

And then...


After 10 minutes or so, I did have a smooth nut butter! This was quite the exciting climax!

Enter the Ordinary Blender

Jonathan came into the kitchen to watch the Magic Bullet fun. What guy wouldn't want to watch? He asked an important question, "Why not make the nut butter in an ordinary blender?"

We loaded the blender up with 8oz of macadamia nuts and used the same pulsing technique. It had the same problems of nut butter getting stuck to the sides and we had to keep sticking a spatula down in the blender to push the nuts to the middle. After 10 minutes, we had smooth, creamy macadamia nut butter.

If your blender is wimpy and can't even crush ice, I wouldn't recommend using it for nut butters. I would, however, recommend getting a new blender over getting a Magic Bullet. Due to its size, your blender will likely be much more useful to you than the Magic Bullet. Size does matter.


Nut Butter Lessons Learned

1. If the nut butter you're looking for is available fresh at the store, I'd recommend buying it rather than making it. All of that poking and prodding in the blender was a bit of a pain.

2. Making your own nut butter is definitely doable and there is no need for any special product like the Magic Bullet.

3. If you like smooth nut butters, keep going even when you think that you're done blending. When I made my macadamia nut butter frosting, I discovered some small nut bits that hadn't gotten blended. These clogged up my piping tip and were an overall nuisance.

Got your own tips for making good nut butter or disagree with my stance on the Magic Bullet? Let me know in the comments.

Do forgive the dirty talk - I couldn't write about nut butter and the Magic Bullet without going there.

Ferrero Rocher Cupcakes: Rich Chocolate Cupcakes with Hazelnut

Kimberly of Kimberly C Baking emailed me about the idea of a Ferrero Rocher cupcake. After I wondered, "What the heck is a Ferrero Rocher?" I looked up Ferrero Rocher on Wikipedia and declared it a great idea.

We talked about her idea for a bit and Kimberly suggested that we both bake different styles of Ferrero Rocher cupcakes and blog about it; another great idea. I was on board still never having tasted the chocolate behind the gold foil.

I picked some up and and gave it a try. Damn. That's a good chocolate. It was no wonder people liked these things. Try some if you have never had them!

I was ready to create. I decided to make a chocolate hazelnut cupcake and give it a gooey ganache filling (like the gooey surprise in the chocolate) and top it with a chocolate ganache with hazelnuts bits in it (again, like the chocolate).

Where to Buy Hazelnut Extract
In order to make said cupcake, however, I needed hazelnut extract. Apparently, there is no demand for hazelnut extract in St. Louis, because nobody carries it. I do have to give special props to Straubs and Penzey's Spices who both went out of the their way to suggest other places I could possibly find it in town. The lady at Penzey's actually called 3 other places for me. Finally, I had to purchase it online here and wait... and wait.. and wait.. OK, it took just a week to arrive, but when I have my heart set on baking something, I am ready. I do not want to wait!

How to Pronounce Ferrero Rocher
While I was waiting, I had more time to plan. I was always hesitant to use the name "Ferrero Rocher" when telling people what I was making because I had/have no idea how to say it. It turns out though, that most people don't know how to say it. Only one person I asked seemed confident in his pronunciation. However, saying the chocolate in the gold foil seemed to be understood by everyone. The cupcake also needed to be easily recognizable. It needed gold.

Using Edible Gold on Cupcakes
For the gold on my cupcakes, I used actual edible gold. What else? I had no idea that gold was edible. Apparently you can eat gold, but it has no nutritional value. It just goes in and comes out. Hmm... I forgot to check for gold flakes in my poop. Good thing I still have some cupcakes left so I can try this experiment.

Finally, my extract came and I was ready to bake. Alas, Kimberly, my partner in crime, was sick. Then, she had to go and be nice and bake someone some chocolate cupcakes for Christmas. She hasn't gotten to bake her Ferrero Rochers yet. I was going to wait and post with her, but did I mention that I don't like waiting?

You are just going to have to promise to check Kimberly's blog and her cupcakes when she get them done. I'll also update this post with a link to her completed cupcakes.

Ferrero Rocher Cupcake Reviews

My husband: "Wow! These are just like the chocolate!"
My friend: "These are some of your best ones yet."
My Mother-In-Law: "These are good, but not as good as the caviar cheesecake ones." (She is alone in this line of thinking.)
My blogging friend: Said nothing at the time, but mentioned them on her blog.
Me: I thought they were perfect. They were a rich, moist chocolate with great hazelnut undertones - but not too sweet. The gooey surprise inside worked really well, as did the ganache. It all just came together.

Ferrero Rocher Cupcake Recipe

The cupcake recipe came from Laura of Sweets Made Here. It is for 12 cupcakes. I doubled it.

• 1/2 c boiling water
• 6 T unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1/4 c milk
• 1/2 t vanilla extract
• 1 T hazelnut extract
• 1/2 c unsalted butter, softened
• 10 T dark brown sugar
• 6 T granulated sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 1 c all-purpose flour
• 1/2 + 1/8 t baking soda
• 1/4 t salt

In a bowl, whisk the boiling water into cocoa until smooth and whisk in milk, vanilla, and hazelnut extracts. In a large bowl, beat together butter and sugars until light and fluffy, about 2 to 3 minutes, and beat in eggs, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Into another bowl, sift together flour, baking soda, and salt and add to egg mixture in batches alternately with cocoa mixture, beginning and ending with flour mixture, and beating well after each addition. Fill each wrapper slightly more than 1/2 way. They will rise a lot. Bake in a preheated 350F oven for about 18 minutes. Cool on a wire rack.

Note: I have never used that much of an extract in a recipe before. I actually worried that it was a typo and she meant teaspoon. However, it definitely needed that much. In fact, I added another whole tablespoon (1/2 if you are only making 12).

The Gooey Chocolate Hazelnut Filling Recipe

If you have some Nutella around, I think you could easily just fill this with Nutella. I did not have Nutella around and didn't want to go to the store.

• 1 c heavy cream
• 1 c semisweet chocolate chips
• 2 t hazelnut extract
  

Bring heavy cream to a boil. Pour over chocolate chips to melt them. Add extract. Mix until fluffy. Let cool. Cut a cone in each cupcake and put a teaspoon or two of the ganache in. Replace the cone.

The Chocolate Hazelnut Ganache Recipe

I used the ganache recipe from Sweets Made Here. The only change I made was that rather than putting hazelnuts on top as she did, I mixed 1 Cup of toasted, ground hazelnuts into the ganache before spreading. Also, while I doubled the cake recipe, I did not double the ganache recipe and I still had plenty.

• 1/2 c heavy cream
• 8 oz good semi-sweet chocolate chunks
• 2 T light corn syrup
• 2 t hazelnut extract

Heat the cream on the stove until it boils. Pour over the chocolate and stir to melt, adding the corn syrup and hazelnut extract.