vanilla extract – Page 2 – Bead Yarn & Spatula

I recently went to Georgetown Cupcake – if you haven’t tried them and you get the opportunity to do so definitely do it, even if you have to wait on a ridiculously long line – to get some cupcakes and while I was there I picked up one of their menus. While they have staple cupcakes they make every day they also have a daily (and monthly) rotating schedule of specialty flavors that they offer as well. One of those specialty flavors is a Lemon Berry cupcake – a lemon and raspberry cupcake with a raspberry frosting topped with a candied lemon – which gave me the idea for a basic lemon cupcake with a raspberry whipped cream frosting which then turned into a raspberry cream cheese frosting. I could have sworn I had a recipe for lemon cupcakes among my recipe stash, but, I couldn’t find one so I turned to Allrecipes to do so. I like using recipes from their website since you can scale them down to whatever serving size you need. After reading through a few recipes I settled on one submitted by Megan C. that was initially scaled for twenty-four cupcakes and I scaled down to twelve. The directions also have a recipe for a Blackberry Buttercream which sounds pretty good as well.

I started by assembling all of my ingredients for the cupcakes: sugar, butter, an egg, vanilla extract, flour, baking powder, milk and a lemon.

Using a Microplane I grated half of the lemon to get the zest and then squeezed it to get the juice.

To make the batter I started off by creaming together the sugar and butter and then adding in the egg.

Once the egg was mixed in well I added in the vanilla extract.

Next up the flour.

Then the milk, lemon zest and juice.

Now it was time to spoon the batter into my prepared cupcake tin. While I did scale the recipe down for twelve cupcakes the batter definitely didn’t look like it was for twelve decent sized cupcakes so while I normally use my ice cream scoop to spoon the batter into the cupcake tins I opted to use my cookie scoop instead so I could be sure to have enough batter for twelve. As you can see the liners were barely halfway filled.

After baking for 20 minutes in a 350 degrees F preheated oven they were done. As I suspected, the cupcakes by no means baked-up to fill the entire liner. Oh well, at least I know for next time that if I am going to make twelve I should scale the recipe to make eighteen cupcakes.

While the cupcakes cooled I got to making the frosting.

As I mentioned before, I was initially planning on making a raspberry whipped cream frosting but decided to make a cream cheese frosting instead since I figured it would hold up better and be a little richer with the lemon cupcake. I actually didn’t follow a specific recipe for it since I’ve made cream cheese frosting quite a few times before and it’s fairly simple. I opted to cut back on the confectioners’ sugar so it wouldn’t be too sweet with the addition of the raspberry jam.

I started by creaming together one stick of unsalted butter and an 8oz. block of cream cheese with a teaspoon of vanilla extract.

I then added in 2 cups of confectioners’ sugar.

And finally 1/4 cup of seedless raspberry jam. It came out to be a nice shade of pink actually.

Once the cupcakes were completely cooled I piped the frosting onto each of the cupcakes using a large star tip.

Final verdict… They were quite yummy, especially the frosting. I plan on using it again for chocolate or vanilla cupcakes.

Lemon Cupcakes

1/2 cup white sugar

1/4 cup butter

1 egg

3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

3/4 cup all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 cup low-fat milk

1/2 lemon, juice and zest

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F

2. Line 12 muffin cups with paper liners

3. Cream sugar and butter in the bowl of a stand mixer until fluffy. Beat in egg and vanilla extract.

4. Beat in flour and baking powder until thoroughly combined; beat in milk, lemon juice, and lemon zest to make a smooth batter.

5. Spoon the batter into the prepared muffin cups.

6. Bake in the preheated oven until cupcake edges are slightly golden brown and a toothpick inserted into the center of a cupcake comes out clean, 20 to 25 minutes. Cool cupcakes completely.

Raspberry Cream Cheese Frosting

1 8 oz. package cream cheese, softened

1 stick unsalted butter, softened

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 cups confectioners’ sugar

1/4 cup seedless raspberry jam

Begin by creaming the cream cheese and butter together and then add in the vanilla extract. Reduce the speed of the mixer to low and add in the confectioners’ sugar, once the sugar is incorporated add in the raspberry jam and continue mixing on medium speed.

A few months ago I went out to dinner and for dessert I had Croissant Bread Pudding and it was delicious. Since then I have been wanting to try to make it myself. I finally got around to it this past weekend. I normally make Panettone Bread Pudding so I pretty much knew how to make it, but, I made a few tweaks to make the recipe my own.

My ingredients were pretty simple: Croissants, Eggs, Heavy Whipping Cream, Sugar, Cinnamon, Vanilla Extract and Rum soaked Golden Raisins.

I started off by slicing nine croissants in half and tearing up the bottom halves and placing them in a greased glass baking dish – I usually just use Baking Cooking Spray. I then placed the top halves right on top.

I started making the custard by whipping together the eggs and sugar until they were combined.

I then added in the heavy whipping cream, cinnamon, vanilla extract and the raisins along with the rum they were soaking in.

Once that was all combined I poured the mixture over the croissants and pressed them down with a spatula to ensure that they would soak up all of the custard. I let this stand for about 15 minutes before placing it in a 350 degrees F preheated oven.

Since I was completely winging this I was a bit unsure of the baking time. I started off by baking it for 30 minutes covered with aluminum foil and then removed the foil and baked it for an additional 15 minutes. When I took it out the oven it didn’t seem like the custard was completely set so I placed it in the oven for an additional 15 minutes and that did the trick.

After it cooled I was eager to see if my “experiment” came out well and I am happy to say it did. My friends (aka taste testers) agreed as well.

I am sure I will be making this again, but, with a few changes. I think that instead of throwing all of the raisins in with the mixture I will layer some of them between the torn pieces of croissants and the top halves. Also, I think I will start off by baking it covered for 45 minutes and then removing the foil for the final 15 minutes.