Experimental Baking: Key Lime Cupcakes

Yea, so I was pretty bored this weekend since all my friends went skiing, and since I don't ski I decides to bake!

I saw this recipe for s'more like cupcakes on Bakerella, but since I'm not a big chocolate fan, and didn't have any coco powder I decided to go with a straight graham cracker cupcake. So here's the recipe I ended up using:

Graham Cracker Cupcakes: makes 7-9?? Bake @ 350 degrees F
3/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cups sugar
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 cup (more or less I think I was at 7/8 of a cup) graham cracker crumbs
1/2 cup milk
1 egg
1 teaspoons vanilla
1/4 cup oil

I say the recipe makes 7-9 for the following reasons:

1. I ran out of the regular size cupcake papers and ended up with 6 regular and 5 mini cupcakes, and I don't know the mini cupcake to cupcake conversion rate
   
2. I had read that graham cracker cupcakes don't tend to rise as much and filled them 3/4 of the way - but they definitely ended up rising!

Check out the pictures:

Mini Cupcakes


Regular Sized Cupcakes


Notice the rise


Finished Graham Cracker Cupcakes!


So if you were paying attention, this post was called Key lime Cupcakes and you're probably thinking "where's the lime?!". Well if you know anything about key lime pie or custards, you normally have to use egg yolks to make them with. This wasn't an option because I wasn't going to bake a filling in it so I tried making this Eggless Lemon Curd Recipe, but with key lime juice instead. This failed miserably as the curd didn't set up at all - so I ended up folding in the liquid mixture into beaten cream cheese and cool whip, which worked out pretty well. I can't really say I have a recipe for this - I kinda just went by taste.

I found this old pumpkin carving tool, which was great for hollowing out the centers


Filled with the frosting-ish mixture


Frosted, using my handy cut end zip lock bag


Ta-Da!


Tips on Making These:

1. I think the finer the graham cracker the better, because then it's more like flour and the flavor is more distributed. I tried using the food processor at first to crush the crackers, but that didn't work out so well. The blender was a much better method
2. Bake time was given around 15min for the s'more cupcakes. I think my regular sized ones too 18-21 min and my mini ones too 12-15min. It's hard to say because I kept opening the oven to check
3. The frosting has a better texture if it's chilled. After mixing it was more liquidy. It tasted fine, but the leftovers cupcakes I put in the fridge and the filling/frosting was better when it was firmer.

~emy

Pageants With Talent

Who watched Miss America this weekend even thought there was NFL Playoff football this weekend?!?

Well if you haven't figured it out - I did. I like Miss America better than Miss USA because it has the talent portion, which adds a whole other level to the competition. You actually need to be good at something else besides looking pretty and being on top of current events... unless your Miss Delaware. Granted she did look very nice in swimsuit and evening gown, and I didn't see if she made it to the interview round, but I think she either need to work on her talent or pick a new one.

Check out her rehearsal (the live show was pretty much the same, except it was more obvious that she didn't point her toes). And for all you non-dancers out there, this performance is not that good:


This is what a dance talent should look more like what Miss Missouri is doing in her rehearsal:


Also just because I couldn't believe this was her talent Miss Arkansas (she was a better singer than some of the top 10 who just sang for their talent:


~emy

New-ish Catchy Bruno Mars Tune

Grenade is Bruno Mars' newest song to hit the radio waves and it's pretty freaking catchy.


At first I just changed the station, but then I was forced to listen to the song because I wasn't able to change it safely at times. Then I found myself singing the chorus with incorrect lyrics after that: "i'll jump on a grenade for you!" <-- not actually in the song. I think this Billboard Studio Session is better, though it doesn't get stuck in my head after listening to it:

happy listening

~emy