Amazing Brownie Pan!

By: Christine

I had seen a lot of infomercials advertising an "amazing brownie pan" that was supposed to make baking brownies easier. I was curious as to how this pan actually worked. I happened to find one of these pans at the Christmas Tree Shop and I knew I had to get it and test it out!

This pan comes with three pieces, the pan, removable bottom, and the dividing grid.

I decided to make on of my favorite brownies; s'mores brownies!

I started out with graham crackers that I crushed into crumbs. I mixed the crumbs with some butter and pressed the mixture into the bottom of the pan. I used my favorite brownie recipe and poured the batter into the pan, on top of the crust. Then I added the dividing grid. I sprinkled some of the graham cracker mixture onto the top of the batter and placed the brownies into the oven.

After the brownies were done baking, I removed them from the oven. Quickly, I added a half of a marshmallow to the top and pressed down slightly. I placed the brownies back into the oven under the broiler to toast the marshmallow.

After the brownies were done baking, I let them cool slightly. Then, I pushed the removable bottom out from the top of the pan with the dividing grid still in and let them cool completely. After the brownies had cooled, I removed the dividing grid and the brownies were complete, and the best part was that the brownies were cut into perfect squares!

This pan helped to create perfect brownies and I can't wait to use it more often!

Cinnamon Bun Cupcakes!

By: Christine

I made these cupcakes for a family cookout and they may have become my new favorite cupcake flavor! Before deciding on cinnamon bun cupcakes, I was going through the list of my favorite cupcake flavors and decided that I wanted to try something that I've never made before. With help from my fiancé, I came up with the idea for these cupcakes, and they were delicious! 

The base for this cupcake is vanilla cake batter. Cinnamon and sugar is then added to the vanilla cake batter

While baking the cupcakes, I made the frosting. I used a vanilla buttercream frosting and added cinnamon and sugar to the frosting, just like I had done for the cupcake batter.

After baking and cooling the cupcakes, it was time to frost them!

You can see the tiny speckles of cinnamon throughout the frosting.

I added a tiny teddy graham cracker to some of the cupcakes and sprinkled on a tiny bit more of the cinnamon and sugar mixture to the other cupcakes.

These cupcakes tasted just like a cinnamon bun. The cake was very moist and the frosting was light and fluffy!
  
These cupcake are now in my top 5 for favorite cupcake flavor!

Strawberry Margarita, Piña Colada, and Key Lime Cupcakes

By: Jill

For the wedding shower of one of my wonderful friends, Katie, I made three different cupcakes that were all "drink/vacation" themed (she's getting married in the Dominican!): Strawberry Margarita, Piña Colada, and Key Lime.

The piña colada cupcake recipe was from one of my favorite bloggers, Beantown Baker. The recipe looked delicious, but I did make a few minor adjustments in the frosting.

For the cupcake itself, the recipes calls for cream of coconut (NOT coconut milk!) and coconut extract.

After the cupcakes were cooked and cooled, I made the frosting. It is a cream cheese/buttercream frosting, but the recipe amount was not enough so I added an extra stick of butter and a bit more powdered sugar and it was perfect!

I took about 2/3 of a cup of the frosting and mixed in some chopped pineapple. I filled the cupcakes with the pineapple mixture and then frosted the cupcakes with the remainder of the frosting.

I sprinkled the cupcakes with some sweetened coconut flakes and topped them with a cherry.

The strawberry margarita cupcake recipe was from another blogger, My Adventures in Food.

It uses fresh strawberries, chopped in the food processor in the cupcake itself. So yummy!

The strawberries are then mixed into the batter with lime zest and a pinch of kosher salt.

The frosting, a Swiss meringue, was something that I had never attempted before. It involves whisking sugar and egg whites over a simmering double boiler until it reaches 160 degrees.

This recipe was also unique because I had never used tequila in a frosting and I was curious as to how it would taste.

This frosting was absolutely amazing! It was light with only a slight hint of tequila.

I used a strawberry to garnish the cupcakes.

The final cupcakes were key lime cupcakes. The recipe I used was from My Madison Bistro.

I also made a few changes to this recipe. I did not use green food coloring and opted to keep the buttermilk color of the cupcakes with the green lime zest in both the cupcakes and frosting. I did not use cream cheese for this frosting recipe and just added an extra stick of butter and some extra powdered sugar.

I liked the look of the green lime zest flecks in the frosting!

These cupcakes were so delicious and unique!

Vanilla Bean Cupcakes with Vanilla Bean Frosting

By: Jill

The title of this blog pretty much says it all! My mother asked me to make these cupcakes for a friend who absolutely loves vanilla. I looked at many different recipes and finally decided to go with this one from Diana's desserts.

I love working with real vanilla bean, even though it's expensive. I love seeing the vanilla bean flecks in the cupcakes!

The batter used egg whites, rather than whole eggs. It was an easy to work with batter that came together nicely.

Diana's recipe gives you two frosting recipe to choose from. I went with the first recipe because it called for vanilla bean, versus the second, which called for vanilla extract. An important thing to note is that the frosting recipe says that it will frost 24 cupcakes, but when I made it there was only enough for 12 cupcakes.

Although these cupcakes are one single flavor, they were really delicious and simple!

Mother's Day Cupcakes

By: Christine

I wanted to make something special for my Mom for Mother's Day so I decided to make angel food cupcakes!

 I wanted the cupcakes to be a little more fun so I colored part of the cake batter pink, some purple, and I left some batter white. I layered the different colors of cake batter into the cupcake tins put them in the oven to bake!

After the cupcakes were done baking, it was easy to see the different layers of color!

I piped on some light and fluffy cream cheese frosting to go with the light and fluffy angel food cake. After the cupcakes were frosting, I made the toppers for these cupcakes. Using springtime colored candy corns, M&M candy, and white candy melts, I created flowers to place on top of the cupcakes.

These cupcakes were so fun to make and they were a great Mother's Day treat for my Mom!