Week four: SNICKER DOODLES!

Last year, my aunt sent me a link to a recipe for a snicker doodle cake she was wanting to make for my cousin's birthday. Snicker doodles are his favorite cookie, so she wanted to make something special. She came up with the brilliant idea that, if the cake turned out well, maybe cupcakes would, too!


And they did...

The original recipe came from www.foodiewithfamily.com but I halved it and tweaked it just a little. I didn't use whole milk, and not nearly as much butter and powdered sugar as the frosting calls for. A friend at work said he really, really liked them... and he doesn't even like the cookie version. It feels good to have success after a failure week.

Root beer extract was found, so I'm pretty sure I'll be attempting Root Beer Float cupcakes again very, very soon. But next we'll have either Double Chocolate Raspberry or Dr. Pepper cupcakes... for Andrea :)

Week three

Last week's Root Beer Float cupcakes were an epic fail due to the use of actual root beer rather than root beer extract and a graham cracker cupcake batter base. However, just because they didn't taste like root beer floats doesn't mean they weren't quickly eaten up by family and coworkers :)


My sister-in-law said she really liked the whipped cream frosting, so I'll probably be making that again on my Root Beer Float do-over.

I won't post the recipe until I've perfected it, so watch for the coming weeks and an amazing Root Beer Float cupcake!

Up next, Snickerdoodle Cupcakes!

Starburst Cupcakes

When coming up with new cupcake flavors, I sometimes try to think about what treats people love. A sweet, sweet boy I know absolutely loves Starbursts. I wanted to make a cupcake especially for him, but I didn't exactly know how to go about doing it. I decided to stick with the original flavors (cherry, strawberry, lemon, and orange) because they are his favorite. One day, I was skimming through the cake recipes and noticed some awesome multi-colored cupcakes! The idea came that I would make the four different flavors in cupcake batter form, scoop a little of each into the liners, and viola! Starburst cupcakes! It wasn't a huge success, but I do know what I need to fix for next time :)


The whole idea wasn't an epic fail. Everyone still liked the cupcakes, they just didn't have as much flavor as I'd hoped.

So here's how it went down:

1 white cake recipe, prepared and divided into four bowls
juice and zest from 1 lemon
1/4 c orange juice
1/2 c strawberry puree
2 T cherry pomegranate juice concentrate (couldn't find just cherry, but it worked!)

Pre-heat the oven to 325. Using this batter in the past, it works best for me to bake the cupcakes at a lower temperature for longer so they raise a little more. Add the four different flavors to their individual cake batters. One at a time, add 1-2 tablespoons of each batter to the cupcake liners until they are 2/3 full. My cupcakes baked for almost 30 minutes, but you could follow the directions on your white cake mix and bake from there.

Next time, I'll probably use all concentrate to get the flavors similar and stronger. I'll also add some citric acid to really make them pop and get more fruit flavor.

To top the cupcakes:
Frost with any vanilla frosting. I used kitchen scissors to cut Starbursts about halfway, twisted them, and put one on each cake. I had thought about melting them down, pouring them on wax paper to cool and breaking them up to make a really sweet topper, but I had to get some other things done. Maybe next time!

Flavalicious and week one!

So, I was sitting here trying to think of which flavor I want to bake this week. I sometimes think out loud at work so, naturally, sometimes I get answers to my random questions. A co-workers said she read yesterday and was surprised I didn't put my planned flavors on the blog... duh! So, here they are :) if anyone has any suggestions on which flavor I should make tomorrow (or Saturday, whenever I find time) please let me know!

Coming in 2012:
Cookies and Cream (done), Starburst (done), Samoa, Churro, Boston Cream Pie, Snickerdoodle, Chocolate Peanut Butter Pretzel, Root Beer Float, Pumpkin Pie, Caramel Apple Crisp (I've made them before, but I need to make adjustments), Peaches and Cream, Gingerbread, Snickers, Banana Split, and French Toast.

Also, any other flavor ideas will be gladly considered. You come up with the flavor, I'll find a way to make it.

With that said, I give you week one...


Cookies and Cream!

I took a basic white cake recipe from and added half a package of crushed Oreos (actually, they were fake Oreos, but no one knew, hee hee hee). While we're on this subject, I love the white cake recipe from Our Best Bites! However, it's not completely from scratch. I'm on the hunt for the perfect from scratch white cake recipe as it is the base for a lot of cupcakes I make. The frosting was just a simple cream cheese frosting with fake Oreos that had been pulverized in my blender. The end result was fantastic, at least that's what I was told. Next race is March 17th which means... cupcake for me!

It all started...

Last year I ran my first full marathon. My very first, and I swore it would be my one and only... until they put that medal around my neck and I felt that amazing feeling of accomplishment. Then I decided to do the same marathon this year. It's really almost like having another part-time job, training 3-4 days a week for a couple hours at a time plus cross-training. It honestly gets very tiring and I wonder all the time why I'm doing it again and if I can even make it. And then I remember another reason I run. Cupcakes. When I started training last year, I cut processed sugar out of my diet completely. I wanted to do everything I could to get my body in peak condition for the race, but I found I missed cupcakes dearly. I wanted them all the time. I would bake them occasionally and found that helped with my craving, crazy enough. I never ate them, I even refrained from licking the delicious batter covered beaters. I gave them away to family and friends and, in a cruel twist, I would take the left overs to a friend at the gym who worked in the protein shop. In a deep cupcake discussion with said friend, we came up with a few flavors I should bake just to see how they would turn out. During this discussion I made a decision. When I crossed the finish line of the marathon I would allow myself to have one. One cupcake. But it couldn't be just any cupcake. It had to be the most amazing cupcake ever. This sparked the idea for my cupcake experiment.

I would bake one new flavor of cupcakes every week, give them to friends and family and protein shop friend, and have them vote for the best cupcake. I would then make this flavor the day before the marathon and partake as soon as I had that finisher's medal. We came up with flavors such as


cherry turnover












key lime pie













hot chocolate...

I baked and baked and baked, every Friday night. Baking cupcakes actually helped me when I wanted to eat one! Key lime pie was the flavor I wanted after the race. The flavor just sounded so good and the frosting smelled incredible. When I made them, I froze one and saved it for race day. I actually made the hot chocolate cupcakes the day before and had one of those, too.


Oh, how I loved those cupcakes. So much, in fact, that I decided to do the experiment again this time around. New flavors, new combinations, and new techniques of cupcake baking.

Cupcake obsession explained... cupcake experiment numero dos comin' at ya!