Spumoni - Not just an icecream served at Italian restaurants

I'll start out by saying, "I love good Spumoni ice cream".  Something about the cherry, chocolate, and pistachio is amazeballs.  I tried to figure out how to best turn this lovely treat into a cupcake.  I will have to make more attempts because this is not it but it was still tasty.

Side note:  Spumoni will forever remind me of my first job here...

Credit

We had a flavor called "Fantasia"  it was pistachio, cherry, and banana.  Tasted weird, lots of people would want to order it.  I would warn them they should probably try it first.  If they disagreed and did not taste test first, 99% of the time they returned and asked for vanilla.  Come on!  I told you you wouldn't like it!  I remember the last barrel of this stuff, hanging out in the back of house we all got spoons and ate the last melty bit until there was Fantasia no more. 

 I made the pistachio the cake part.  I could not find unsalted pistachios so I used pistachio pudding to flavor the cake.  Definitely not strong enough.  I think next time I can rinse some pistachios and chop them up to use as decoration to add to the flavor or use chocolate cake with pistachio pudding filling....

I'm trying to remember but I think I mixed in chocolate chips for the "chocolate" portion of the Spumoni.

Next was the cherry, while at the grocery store and making up the recipe on the fly, I asked the hubs "is there some type of cherry flavoring?" To which he said, "I don't think so."  So I bought some maraschino cherries and used the juice to add to the buttercream frosting.  I also peeled the skin off of about a dozen of the cherries to cut up and add to the frosting to try and get that cherry zing.  This did not work.  I do not recommend it at all, it was a lot of work and not a lot of flavor. 

Fast forward to the next day when discussing said cupcakes with the hubs...
Me:  I wonder what I can use next time to make the cherry flavor better?
Hubs:  Oh you mean like grenadine, the stuff they use in Shirley Temples?
Me:  Where were you with this idea yesterday when we were at the grocery store?!
Hubs:  I was rushed and not thinking clearly.  I didn't know that was what you meant when you asked about cherry flavoring.

So, we have the not so Spumoni Cupcakes.  They look pretty but will have to be revamped for next time...

Cute right?  Maybe also I can use the aforementioned grenadine and make Cherry Coke cupcakes :)

Hubby Rating

"Can't recall"

Happy Baking,

Lemon Blueberry

Two posts, one week what?!  Yup trying to catch up.  This week I made Lemon Blueberry Cupcakes. 
I LOVE lemon cake so I used the lemon cake recipe I tried and liked for the lemon strawberry cupcakes.  I filled them with lemon curd and topped them with Blueberry Cream Cheese Frosting.  The blueberry wasn't as strong as I had hoped for but the lemon cake was good :).  Maybe next time I can add in some

To get a better blueberry taste.  I also finally got to use the super cute cupcake wrappers my friend Kacie got me months ago.  I've been waiting for a perfect cupcake to use them for.

I added some fresh Blueberries to a few of them



Cracked open for lemony goodness



Hubby Rating

Cake:  8

Frosting: 7

Filling:  9

Overall:  8.5

Happy Baking,

Sorry this is all Bolded, can't figure out how to turn it off...

You'll definitely want S'More of these cupcakes

It's been FOREVER since I last posted and it had been FOREVER since I baked it seemed.  I've been trying new concoctions and they have been good but not great.  Last week I made S'More cupcakes from the recipe at MarthaStewart.com, which is the recipe from the owner of Trophy Cakes.  Never heard of it but if it was good enough for Martha, it must be good!  The recipe starts out with making graham cracker crusts for the cupcakes.  The recipe did not make enough for 24 cupcakes so I had to wing it make some extra by guesstimate.  I also found a good use for shot glasses, pressing graham cracker crust into cupcake papers :)  Once you put the crust in the papers, you sprinkle them with shaved chocolate, or in my case, chocolate chips and bake them until the crusts are golden, approx. 5 minutes. 

 Then you add in the "soupy" chocolate batter and sprinkle with the extra graham cracker crust and bake.  They kinda sank but I just used it as an opportunity to add LOTS of marshmallow frosting.  It was like a crater filled with marshmallowy goodness.  Anyways, I baked them and they turned out ok but then I had a baking FAIL.  I tried to make a mini cake in the mini cake pans I have yet to use and the cake bubbled over and created a gooey mess in the oven...miserable. 

Then  I went on to make the "marshmallow" topping.  After watching some Food Network I deduced this was more of a meringue than a marshmallow but then it wouldn't fit the S'More theme so it's marshmallow.  Basically it's egg white (I used the liquid kind from the milk section) sugar, and vanilla.  Pretty tasty. 

The frosting was a mess to work with but I piped them all and then the hubs toasted them with the kitchen torch.  I think he enjoyed it too much and for the next few days he was torching almost everything that came out of the kitchen, and even some things that were not food, like using it to light candles.  It was fun to see it torched because it puffs and then turns golden brown.  We had to be careful not to set the wrappers on fire...
Anyways, they turned out good and the chocolate chips in the bottom added that need S'more essence. 

These cupcakes leave a lot of room to expand on.  Just like how I discovered last year you can make S'mores with Reese's PB Cups...maybe next time..

See the crater of marshmallow?

Hubby Rating
Cake:  9
Frosting:  9.6
Appearance:  7
Overall:  9.2
Happy Baking,