A Lesson in Frosting

The Roomie and I always have the debate on which butter is better. My vote is for unsalted sweet cream; he votes for salted. Both of us buy Costco butter (although I only use it for baking, whereas he apparently has enough uses for it otherwise... I'll leave that one alone). He's even got his daughter trained.


Roomie asks, "What kind of butter should we have on our toast? Unsalted?"
5 yr old replies, "Unsalted? EWWW!" (sticks out tongue in disgust)


For toast and other direct butter-to-mouth applications, I'd probably agree that salted is better. But for baking, it's gotta be unsalted. I already feel bad enough about contributing to the population's diabetes and obesity problems, so the last thing I need is high blood pressure and heart disease on my conscience too. 


Tonight, I frosted Barb's cupcakes. After a sampling, The Boyfriend and I agreed that these were the best cupcakes yet. We'll get to that later. We'll start with the good stuff first - the frosting.


2 sticks cold unsalted butter, cut into small cubes
Pinch of salt
3 1/2 cup powdered sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup raspberry puree
1 tsp lemon juice


Although the mixer received a big HOO-RAH, I also have to give props to my mixing bowl - a gift from the BFF Zohra. The same year, she also gave me a hand-me-down mixing bowl - which is my other favorite bowl. Seems fitting since I apparently bake wherever I go.

The Mix Master

Place the butter into a deep mixing bowl - the tall edges will help with powder fluff later. Add salt (I used a few grinds from the salt grinder). Mix until creamy and fluffy; be patient. Scrape beaters as necessary.

Here comes the messy part. Remember when I mentioned the tall edges of the mixing bowl? They help keep the powdered sugar in the bowl and out of your eyes. Add the sugar, 1/2 cup at a time (for the math deficient, that's 7 half cups.) until fluffy, creamy, and hard to resist.

Add vanilla and raspberry puree. I threw the defrosted berries in a blender and gave 'em a quick whirl to create the puree. The bright red color splotches were reminiscent of an episode of Dexter, only less creepy and lacking murder.

This blender was also $15, but not as useful as the mixer

I've used this recipe before (for the lemon, the strawberry, and the maple icing) but never with raspberry. I don't typically eat raw dough or batter, or even lick the beaters, but I think this pic indicates how much I liked the final result! 

I had enough self-control to stop after the first one

You're probably thinking that raspberry frosted vanilla cupcakes would be delicious in themselves, but I didn't stop here. Very special people deserve very special cupcakes. So I filled them (or as The Boyfriend says, "Stuffed Cupcakes."


What could possibly increase the amazing-ness of these cupcakes? Cheesecake pudding, of course. Since my mixing bowl was occupied and my beaters needed washing, I used my kitchen resource maximization skills and used what I had access to - the blender.

2 minutes on medium and Voila! 

So... how does the pudding get inside the cupcake? With a squeeze bottle, of course! The pudding is soft set and pours easily into the squeeze bottle (I bought a six pack of ol' skool style ketcup bottles for $6.37 and knew I could find a use for them...p.s. Zohra, you're getting one for Christmas). Put the pudding into the fridge for 5 minutes while the frosting is scooped into a piping bag.


NOTE: You do not need to use a piping bag. Period. A quart sized Ziplock freezer bag works just fine, but I wanted to use the special piping kit that I also bought. Apparently I like Cash and Carry almost as much as I like Costco. 


Filling cupcakes is a two handed operation. Puncture the cupcake center with the tip of the squeeze bottle, at an angle. Rotate the cupcake 360 degrees and use the bottle nose to dig out a center. Do another 360 rotation - but this time squeeze the bottle gently. As you finish the rotation, gently pull out the bottle. You'll know it's time to pull out when you feel pressure in the cupcake, and the pudding starts to ooze out the top. Yes, you can laugh hysterically at the pudding-rotation-pull-out-method. You're welcome. 

Before you frost, line up your cupcake army. It's easier to maneuver when they're close together. And pipe the farthest cupcakes first to avoid sleeve / frosting malfunction. I pipe in swirling clockwise circles, starting from the center - only because that's just about the only way I know how to! If you've got mad pipe skillz - use 'em!

nom nom nom

The finished cupcakes - pretty, aren't they? I'm not into artificial food coloring, but the bright red raspberries gave the frosting a gorgeous color. 

The Best $15 Purchase

I've always been proud (well, let's be honest - boastful) about my homemade baked goodies. I painstakingly cream together butter and sugar with nothing more than my favorite wooden spoon, a lot of patience and generous output from my right bicep muscle. I brag that hard work and love are what make my cookies more delicious than others (that statement may have been a bit premature).


Last year, on one of our weekly trips to the Quah Target, we walked by the kitchen aisle (as we always do). I browsed the appliances and impulsively grabbed a $15 hand-held electric mixer. Not the fancy Kitchen-Aid stand up mixer. Not a mixer with multiple speeds, attachments, flashing lights, or other worthwhile technology. Just a $15 mixer with 6 speeds, 2 beaters, and an additional whisk attachment (although it only came with 1 beater, so maybe I even picked up the reject package). It sat and collected dust in its first year. 


During birthday season at work (yes, we have an entire season for birthdays - as in 5 of 7 team members have b-days within a 5 week period) the mixer was brought out of hibernation a few times. It wasn't until the year of the D3 (that is, Dirty Thirty) where I realized the true value of a handheld mixer.


Let's back up a bit. The week was the United Way Bake Sale, which is a "fundraiser" in all shapes in forms but for me it's a chance to annihilate the competition in the company. (I took 1st place for the 3rd year in a row, and won the coveted Red Spatula Award). I sold $175 in baked goods in about 5 hrs. The weekend was Sarah's D3 party, where I would break all my rules (i.e. "I don't bake cupcakes") and cater her cupcakes. My life has been a cupcake factory ever since. 

The Red Spatula

Sarah's birthday ended up with 5 flavors and over 70 cupcakes: Golden Butter w/ Fudge Frosting, Strawberry on Strawberry, Mocha w/ PB Cream Cheese Frosting, Autumn Spice w/ Maple Icing, and Lemon w/ Lime Icing. The Boyfriend came home from school to a house and front yard smelling like a bakery. Cupcakes aren't even the star of the show - it's all in the frosting!

Autumn Spice w/ Maple; Mocha w/ PB Cream Cheese

Strawberry on Strawberry; Lemon w/ Lime Icing

Golden Butter w/ Fudge

Homemade frosting comes from butter, powdered sugar, and an electric mixer. Hands down. I had butter in every nook and cranny in the house (even a bit on Kona the Pup) and enough powdered sugar to make even the DEA suspicious of Columbian coke dealers within my pastry operation. 


And if 70 cupcakes wasn't enough, I ended up with keg cups of leftover frosting in the fridge. What was a girl supposed to do? Throw it out? What a waste! Instead, I make more cupcakes for the Coworkers (ultimately building my reputation as a bad ass baker so that I can again annihilate in the 2011 Bake Sale). 

Next up - Melanie's D3. Here comes Freckled Strawberry Lemonade and Espresso Chip cupcakes. Strawberry cakes were the favorite, but the espresso frosting was definitely the buzz!


And last night - Lemon on Lemon for the Boyfriend's potluck at Microsoft. Plus Caramel Macchiato Brownies (milk chocolate brownie w/ caramel filling and espresso frosting). So what if I have a issue throwing away frosting? It'd be such a waste (typical psychology of a hoarder...)


And tomorrow - pudding filled white cupcakes w/ raspberry frosting for Barb's birthday. Gotta spoil my workplace "mom". I told the Boyfriend that I'd be done after those ones...


But I lied. Tuesday - Choco-holic Cupcakes for Tony's birthday. Gotta spoil the Payroll guy who fixes your mistakes (that's good business). 


Everyone always asks, "How do you stay in shape if you bake all the time?" 
I always say, "I don't eat what I bake."
Now, I should say, "I don't eat what I bake in front of you, I hoard it like a fat kid hoards cupcakes."