Valentine's Cupcakes

I bought the Feb 15 issue of Woman's Day on a whim.

Good whim.

Flipping through to the food section, I spied a couple of interesting recipes, neither of which I've tried before, and one of which was for tiramisu cupcakes.

I couldn't get my hands on hazelnut meal at short notice, so substituted almond meal. This probably contributed to the lack of nutty flavour. I also put a decent splonk of frangelico into the mix instead of a measly teaspoons-worth. And I don't have a texan muffin pan so used an ordinary 12-hole cupcake/muffin pan, total cooking time didn't change though. Oh, and if I do this again I'll add a bit more icing sugar to the cream filling to sweeten it up a little bit. I had good feedback about this one, but for me it needs a little improving.


Tiramisu Cupcakes (from Womans Day, Feb 15 2010, p50)

125g butter, chopped, at room temperature
2/3 cup caster sugar
2 eggs, separated
1 tsp Frangelico
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup hazelnut meal
1/2 cup self-raising flour, sifted
1/2 cup milk
cocoa powder, to dust
chocolate hearts, to garnish

CREAM FILLING:
1/2 cup cream, whipped
1/2 cup mascarpone
1 tsp instant coffee powder
1 tsp icing sugar

Preheat oven to 180C. Line a 6-hole Texan muffin pan with paper cases. Cream butter and sugar in a bowl until light and fluffy. Add egg-yolks one at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in Frangelico and vanilla.

Combine hazelnut meal and flour in a separate bowl. With beaters on low speed, alternately add flour mixture and milk to creamed butter mixture, beginning and ending with the flour mix.

In a small clean bowl, beat egg-whites until stiff peaks form. Lightly fold into cake mixture.

Spoon evenly between paper cases to 2/3 full. Bake 30-35 minutes or until cooked. Cool in the pan 5 minutes before turning onto a wire rack to cool completely.

Filling: gently fold cream into mascarpone with coffee and sugar. Using a sharp-pointed knife, cut a circle from the top of each cake. Fill cavities with coffee cream, then dust with cocoa powder.


But I did say that there were two, right? Well, the other was a pretty damn sure success.

My first experience with red velvet cake came late last year, and I've been a staunch fan ever since. So I was VERY happy to flick a few pages on from the tiramisu cupcakes to find a recipe for pink velvet cakes. My ganache turned out nothing like the picture in the magazine, but the flavour was aaaallllllll there. It just ended up as more of a glaze than anything else :) The recipe in the mag calls for a side of BBQd plums, berry liquer, and cream. I passed on that.

I put more than the "few drops" of food colouring, and used red instead of pink as that's what I had. And these babies were certainly... vibrant. But they were the winner, hands down. I'm so bummed I only had one.


Pink velvet cakes (slightly adapted from the one in Woman's Day, Feb 15 2010, p54)

90g butter, chopped, at room temperature
1/2 cup caster sugar
2 eggs
1 cup self-raising flour
1 tbl cocoa powder
1/2 cup milk
few drops pink food colouring (or, as I did, a slug of red)

GANACHE:
1/4 cup cream
100g white chocolate

Preheat oven to 180C. Line a 12-hole muffin tin with paper cases. In a small bowl, beat butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.

Sift flour and cocoa together, then lightly fold into creamed mixture alternately with the milk, beginning and ending with the flour. Add the colouring with the last milk portion.

Spoon into muffin cases. Bake 20-25 minutes or until cooked. Cool in pan for 5 minutes, then turn onto a wire rack to cool completely.

Ganache: Heat the cream in a small saucepan until nearly boiling, then remove from heat and stir in the chocolate until it's melted and the mix is smooth. Let it cool (for a LONG time) until it's spreadable, then slather all over the cupcakes.

Lick the saucepan of any leftovers/dribbles.