S'Mores Cupcakes

To break the monotonous bread posts, I thought I would share a cupcake recipe.  This was the cupcakes that I made for my son's birthday last month.  I had to return the book to the library before I had a chance to write down the recipe hence the gap of almost a month.  So here in November I'm writing the recipe since I got to borrow the book again.  The book is called Cake Magic!  Mix and Match Your Way to 100 Amazing Combinations by Caroline Wright.  I've always loved trying out recipes from a new book and this book has lots of colorful photos and ideas to make cakes from a few basic recipes.  There are about eight cake recipes where each recipe has four or five variants of flavors.  It's pretty interesting and I'd love to try some more recipes.

So there's a dry cake mix that you need to prepare before you choose which kind of cake you'd want to make.  In this case, I chose to do a brown sugar cake.  I'd add brown sugar, butter, eggs, yogurt, etc to the dry cake mix to make the cake.  Within brown sugar cake category, there's a few options/add-ins to the cake.  For example, cinnamon-raisin, nuts, chocolate chip, root beer , and so on.  In addition to that, this book uses different kinds of syrups to soak the cake, sort of making it has a more complex flavor and helping the cake stays moist.  It's kinda fun to pick and choose which flavor combinations to go with, and the book gives plenty of pairings examples.

The only thing that I don't like is the method of making the cake.  It involves only dump and stir the ingredients resulting in a cake that has quick-bread-like texture rather than a fine and luxurious crumbs.  I'm going to try the creaming method next time I try another recipe, hoping to improve the texture of the cake.  But we love the flavor combination for this time and this S'mores Cupcakes was a hit!

S'Mores Cupcakes

Yields 24 cupcakes

Cake Magic! Cake Mix:

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 cups sugar
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon table salt

Place all of the ingredients in a large bowl and whisk together well to combine.  Whisk the mix again before measuring.

Brown Sugar Cake:

1 quantity of Cake Magic! Cake Mix, whisked well before measuring
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, melted and cooled
3/4 cup full-fat plain yogurt
2/3 cup water
1 tablespoon unsulfured molasses
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
4 large eggs, at room temperature


Vanilla Syrup
Bittersweet Chocolate Frosting
Graham Cracker Crumble
Mini marshmallows or large marshmallows, cut into two


Preheat the oven to 350 degree F.  Line 2 x 12-cup muffin pans with cupcake liners.

Whisk together the cake mix, baking soda, and brown sugar in a large bowl.  Stir in the butter, yogurt, water, molasses, vanilla, and eggs until moistened and no lumps remain.  Divide the batter between the prepared pans.

Bake until the layers are domed and a few moist crumbs cling to a skewer inserted in the center of the cake, 20 to 25 minutes.  Make the Vanilla Syrup.

Remove the pans from the oven, pierce the cupcakes while they're still in the pans with a skewer.  Generously brush the Vanilla Syrup over the surface to the hot cakes.  Place the pans on cooling rack to cool completely.  This may take up to an hour.  Take the cupcakes out of the pans.

While waiting for the cupcakes to cool, make the frosting.  Frost the cupcakes with Bittersweet Chocolate Frosting.  Sprinkle the Graham Cracker Crumble on top, pat down to make them stick.  Top each cupcake with marshmallows.  Torch the marshmallows until slightly blackened.


Vanilla Syrup:

Makes 1 cup

1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup water
Pinch of salt
1 tablespoon vanilla extract

Combine the sugar, water, and salt in a small saucepan, bring to a boil over medium-high heat, and boil for about 5 minutes.  Stir to dissolve the sugar, then stir in the vanilla and remove from the heat.  Set aside to cool.  Use the syrup warm or let it stand, covered, until it reaches room temperature.


Bittersweet Chocolate Frosting:

Makes 2 cups

3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 tablespoon unsweetened cocoa powder
Pinch of salt
2 cups confectioners' sugar
2 ounces unsweetened chocolate, melted and cooled

Combine the butter, unsweetened cocoa powder, salt, and 1 cup of the sugar in a large bowl and beat with an electric mixer on low speed until incorporated, about 1 minute.  Add the remaining sugar and beat on medium speed until the frosting is pale and no longer grainy, about 2 minutes.


Graham Cracker Crumble:

Makes about 3 cups

2 sleeves graham crackers (about 10 cracker sheets), finely crushed (about 2 cups)
1/4 cup malted milk powder
2 tablespoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
6 tablespoons (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, melted

Preheat the oven to 300 degree F.  Line a large rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper.

Combine the graham cracker crumbs, malted milk powder, sugar, and salt in a large bowl and toss to combine.  Drizzle with melted butter over the crumb mixture and stir until clumps form.

Scatter the clumps onto the prepared baking sheet in a single layer.  Bake until the crumbles are golden brown and fragrant, 10 to 15 minutes.  Let cool completely before using.

This can be made ahead as it can be kept in an airtight container at room temperature, for up to 3 days.


Source:  adapted from Cake Magic!  Mix and Match Your Way to 100 Amazing Combination by Caroline Wright

Chocolate Hazelnut Cupcakes

I don't think I've made cupcakes often enough and I've never caught the cupcake fever a few years ago.  But I think cupcake is still favored by people; why they're like little cakes complete with frosting.  I do like cupcakes and this time I'm making this chocolate cupcakes stuffed with Ferrero Rocher in the middle.  The inspiration behind the cupcakes was a post by Bakers Royale's Nutella Cupcakes.  I'm taking it a lot simpler than that because at the time I was researching for a good, solid chocolate cupcake recipe so I didn't need to do a complicated frosting to go with it.  This cupcake is decent and delicious although I didn't add the 2 tablespoons instant coffee to the batter.  I thought it would make the cupcake tasted a little way too much coffee-y to me.

Little did I know that after I made these I had to make many more cupcakes for my son's school's function--though they're with different frosting and no Ferrero Rocher (that chocolate candy is so addictive).  I made some for myself--ehem, my family, and stashed them in the freezer.  I doled out four at a time and was glad that I made extra because I got to have a nice, personal-sized dessert every night :)

Chocolate Hazelnut Cupcakes

Makes 12 cupcakes



1 cup all-purpose flour

1 cup plus 2 tablespoons sugar

1/3 cup plus 2 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted and warm

2 large eggs

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1/2 cup hot coffee

12 Ferrero Rocher

Whipped Cream Frosting:

1 1/2 cups heavy cream

2 1/2 tablespoons sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Unsweetened cocoa powder



To make cupcakes:

Position a rack in the lower third of the oven.  Heat the oven to 350 degree F.  Line a muffin pan with cupcake liners.

Add flour, cocoa powder, sugar, baking soda, and salt in a bowl and whisk thoroughly with  to combine.

In a mixing bowl, add the butter, eggs, and vanilla; beat with paddle attachment on medium speed for one minute. Add flour to egg mixture and beat for 20 seconds.  Scrape the sides of the bowl and add instant coffee.  Beat again for 20-30 seconds until the batter is smooth.  The batter will be thin enough to pour.

Divide it evenly among the lined cups.  Place a whole Ferrero Rocher in the center of each well.  Bake 18-22 minutes just until a toothpick inserted into a few of the cupcakes comes out clean.  Set the pan on a rack to cool.  Frost the cupcakes when they are completely cool.

To make the frosting:

Place heavy cream, sugar, and vanilla extract in a chilled bowl and beat with an electric mixer on high speed until stiff peak forms.  Transfer the frosting to a large resealable plastic bag.  Snip the end of a corner of the plastic bag and pipe an even amount of frosting onto the cupcakes.  Sprinkle cupcakes with unsweetened cocoa powder before serving.

Mocha Rollcake with Strawberries-Lemon Whipped Cream Filling

The title is long but the cake is short and sweet.  I've a passion for Japanese baking books, they're my inspirations even though I can't even read or speak the language.  I'm craving those exquisite pictures on those books and the recipes are also intriguing.  The pictures depicted a variety of combination in desserts that looks pretty in the books though I'm not so sure if I can have all the ingredients here in the US.  But, these don't deter me from deciphering some of the recipes.  Rollcakes are something that I want to learn and be better at making it.  I think rollcakes are pretty, what with the different flavor fillings I can make and also different types of cakes to be used for rollcake.  Sponge cake, choux paste, meringue, genoise, and many other types of cake can be made into rollcakes.  The main thing is to master the rolling part so the cake won't crack, but hey, if it happens grab a bowl and make some frosting!  Slather that on top of the cake, et voilà, the cake is ready.

At this time I made a rollcake with sponge cake base.  The method is practically the same as this post and the filling is the same this post.  I've based my rollcake from two books which I, unfortunately, don't know the name of the books or one of the authors--I only know that on one book the author is Kumiko Yanase.  The strawberries aren't local, I embarrassedly admitted but since they look pretty in rollcake I have to include them.  The one thing that maybe hard to find here, if not cheap to buy, is the mocha paste.  As for myself, I have a bottle of mocha paste that I bought in Indonesia.  Here, I found a company that makes mocha paste which is sold at VeryAsia.com and it's a product of Indonesia as well.

I've never thought that lemon-strawberry-mocha flavors could be combined in a harmoniously in this rollcake but I like it and I love to do more rollcakes in the future.  Looking at the pictures, I feel like it's Christmas once again with the color combination! ;)

Mocha Rollcake with Strawberries-Lemon Whipped Cream Filling

Makes 1 large rollcake



For the rollcake:

6 large egg yolks, at room temperature

5 large egg whites, at room temperature

1oo gr confectioners' sugar, sifted and divided in half

1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar

1/2 tablespoon mocha paste

50 gr all-purpose flour, sifted

50 gr unsalted butter, melted

For the filling:

Lemon curd-whipped cream filling, you'll only need about 1/2 of the recipe

10 strawberries, each cut into quarters

For the whipped cream frosting:

1 teaspoon unflavored gelatin powder

4 teaspoons cold water

1 cup heavy whipping cream, cold

1/4 cup confectioners' sugar

1/2 teaspoon clear vanilla extract

Confectioners' sugar for dusting



Line a 10-x 15-inch jellyroll pan with parchment paper.  Preheat the oven to 400 degree F.

To make the rollcake: In a bowl of stand in mixer with a wire whisk, cream egg yolks and half the sugar until pale and thick.  Add mocha paste and mix in until well blended.  With a clean bowl, whip egg whites and cream of tartar until frothy, add last half of sugar until soft peak, fold a little bit of egg white into the egg yolk and then pour all the egg yolk mixture into the egg whites.  Sift the flour and fold over.  Add melted butter and fold quickly, just until the butter is blended.  Pour batter into the pan.

Bake on center rack for 12 minutes, or until it's light brown and shrink a bit from sides of pan.  Immediately take out from the oven and invert to a parchment paper that's been lightly sprayed with cooking spray and slightly bigger than the cake, on top of a flat surface.  Roll the cake and unroll it , this is to get the cake ready.  Leave the cake to cool for 10 minutes.

Spread the lemon curd-whipped cream filling on the cake, covering evenly.  Arrange cut strawberries on one of the short side of the cake and scatter some strawberries all around the cake.  Roll the cake tightly and try to peel off the parchment paper from the bottom of the cake as well.  Cover the whole cake with another parchment paper and leave it to cool completely.

To make whipped cream frosting: Combine gelatin and cold water in small ramekin.  Let stand until thick.  Fill a small saucepan with a bit of water and place over low heat.  Stir gelatin until becomes liquidy and remove from saucepan.  Let stand and cool slightly.  Whip cream, sugar, and vanilla extract until slightly thickened.  While beating slowly, gradually add gelatin to whipped cream mixture.  Whip at high speed until stiff.  There'll be leftovers of whipped cream from frosting the cake.

Frost the cooled roll cake with whipped cream and if you like, pipe dots on top of cake with whipped cream.  Scatter cut strawberries on top of whipped cream, press down slightly.  Dust with confectioners' sugar if desired just before cutting.  The cake needs to be refrigerated and will keep for about 3 days.

Rum Raisin Sponge Cake

After about two weeks or so passed with no baking activity, suddenly I was craving something sweet and cakey.  I chose to make this rum raisin sponge cake.  A long time ago I baked this but I made some mistake in the process and it came out wrong.  This time I decided to try again and proceeded to make this today.  The recipe came from an Indonesian baking book, and books from Indonesia are infamous for being ambiguous about explaining the step-by-step process of baking.  I don't know if this has changed lately because the book that I have was bought 5 years ago.  It seems that when it's a book about cake or Western-style baking, the instructions are scanty; I usually have to consult baking books that I bought here.  Even with the help of my baking books, still I'm puzzled as to what kind of method would be appropriate for certain recipes.  Just recently one of my friends complained that she too found that those baking books that she bought in Indonesia were useless, the temperature of the oven is missing as well as how long it is to bake the cake.  So much for hauling many kilos of books, only to found out that they're not worth the money.

Having said that, I still buy some books whenever I travel to Indonesia because Indonesian-style cakes are different from any cakes I found here.  The flavor combination reflects what I used to eat and the recipes are not overly sweet.  Back to the cake, I started by macerating raisins in rum the night before so the flavor will be full-bodied.  Okay, honestly, I made this twice in three days because I messed up during the mixing and the cake was too dense to be called sponge cake.  I did one again today and made some tweaks in the recipe to get everything right.   Besides, my husband is enamored with the cake that he urged me to make it again.

To make the lightest sponge cake, make sure you sift the flour, sift the confectioners' sugar, beat the egg whites to soft peak, sift the flour again before mixing together, fold the ingredients with light hand, and pray that it'll come out intact :)  Here is the recipe for the cake, it seems fitting to eat this since the weather definitely says spring.

Rum Raisin Sponge Cake

Serves 8 to 10



75 gr raisins

2 Tablespoons dark rum

100 gr all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

Pinch of salt

4 egg yolks

25 gr granulated sugar

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

100 ml canola cooking oil

4 egg whites

1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar

75 gr confectioners' sugar, sifted

Extra confectioners' sugar for sprinkling



The day before making the cake, place raisins in a small bowl with the rum and let it steep overnight covered.

Sift flour, baking powder, and salt together in a medium bowl.  Sift confectioners' sugar.  Have ready a 8-x 3-inch round cake pan, grease bottom and sides of pan, line bottom of pan with parchment paper, and grease the paper again.  Preheat oven to 350 degree F.

Place egg yolks and sugar in a bowl of a standing mixer, beat with wire whisk until it turns pale in color, about 2 minutes, scraping sides frequently.  Add vanilla extract and canola oil, beat again for about 1 minute.

In a clean bowl with wire whisk, beat the egg whites with cream of tartar until frothy.  Pour confectioners' sugar gradually, scrape sides if needed.  Beat with high speed until the mixture reaches soft peak.  Take a cupful of egg white mixture to the bowl of egg yolks mixture, stir until combined.  Add this mixture to the egg whites and using folding technique, fold these two together until halfway combined.  Sift flour mixture on top of the bowl and fold again until the flour disappears.  Lastly, add the macerated raisins and fold until well combined.

Pour into the pan, tap the pan lightly on the counter and bake on the center rack about 40 to 45 minutes.  The top of cake should be brown and spring back when touched.  When it's done, immediately invert the pan onto a plate lined with parchment paper.  Peel off the parchment paper from the bottom of cake and invert again onto a cooling rack lined with parchment paper.  Let it cool completely before cutting.  Sprinkle with confectioners' sugar if desired.