Almond Dream Cupcakes

First, NO, despite how they look, this is not the Vanilla/Almond with Salted Caramel Buttercream Cupcake. I hadn't realized when I put the almonds on it how closely they looked. From now on the Salted Caramel cupcakes will not have almonds on them if I ever reproduce a photo.



This is a Jumbo cupcake. I love the Jumbo cupcake. There's more to love! The cake is a white cake with almond paste and chopped almonds baked in, almond cream center, and an almond paste buttercream. If asked yes, I would add alcohol in the form of Amaretto. I also added some edible glitter to the buttercream :). I had a photo of the center of the cupcake but my camera must have, in thinking how delicious it looked, ate it.

I have my first request for samples! WOOT! I will be working on those later this week and will post about them. I do samples (yes for a small fee) in the form of minis. I also should get to the Twilight Cupcake here shortly.

I've decided to do a Cupcake Party for my South Florida friends so I hope that will turn out well.

Hope you all had a wonderful turkey day!

OMG I WON!!

I want to thank Lindor Chocolates for taking the time to do this contest. It was so yummy to read everyone's entries! I have new inspiration too!

And I am honored to be their winner! I am so excited!! This is my most favorite chocolate hands down!! I can't wait to go and buy more Lindt Chocolate!!

I think I will go buy a box to celebrate! :)


http://blog.lindtusa.com/dessert-recipe-winner

Chocolate Cupcakes with Lindt Hazelnut Truffle Centers and Lindt Stracciatella Buttercreme

Ok so I made these to enter a contest Lindor Chocolates is holding this year. The object is to create a dessert using their chocolates. I couldn't pass up a cupcake with my favorite chocolate. I want to visit Switzerland just to go see where they make all this fabulous chocolate!

I'm distracted.......anyhow. This is a simple Devil's Food Cake base to which I folded in chopped up Lindt Milk Chocolate Truffles. After the cupcakes are out of the oven, I pressed a Lindt Hazelnut Truffle partway down the middle while it was still hot. This makes the truffle melt. While they cooled, I made a simple buttercreme base, melted about 12 stracciatella truffles (they melt very fast) and then poured the melted truffles into the buttercreme base and mixed. Once the cupcakes were cooled, I piped the Stracciatella buttercreme on top and shaved some Lindt Dark Chocolate on top.



They were VERY rich. But they were also VERY good. Quite an expensive cupcake to make as you might know the truffles aren't really cheap. The three bags of truffles alone was close to $12.00 for about 10 - 12 pieces each. But I had fun and maybe I'll have my recipe featured on their site and win that $100 gift card so I can have all that decadent Swiss lusciousness I want!

Almond Dream Cupcakes & Lindor Lindt Truffles Cupcakes

School keeps getting in the way! Grrrr! Well that and holidays but HEY! Time to bake.......

This weekend I will be making two cupcakes because one is for a contest and the other is well...because I love almonds!

Photos and such to follow!

Week of November 15th - Twilight Cupcakes (Spiced Apple Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting)
Week of November 22nd - Peanut Butter Cupcakes, Rainbow Cupcakes and Turkey Cupcakes (no it's not made with Turkey! But should be cute when finished!)
Week of November 29th - Gingerbread Cupcakes

Also want to do the Christmas Tree Cupcakes

Planning a cupcake party in South Florida in December! Let me know if you're interested!

Oh forgot! Lindor is doing a contest on dessert recipes. I've been dieing to use their truffles in a cupcake recipe so this weekend I'll be making one. Just have to decide which truffle(s) to use! I LOVE Lindt chocolate!

Pumpkin Pie in a Cupcake

OK so I DID make these. However thanks to the gods that be (sarcasm) the photos are no longer on my camera and the cupcakes are all gone. Sighs....

HOWEVER.....they were sooooooooooooo good. OMG were they good. I had to substitute the icing because I can't find Cinnamon Chips anywhere. I've seen them before but I'm thinking maybe they aren't out yet?? I made a simple Cinnamon Buttercreme that turned out really nice! Mom gave me the idea to actually make a cake with these flavors. That is definitely doable.

The recipe did take a very long time to do since I decided to make my own pie crust. So I had to make the pie crust, make the pumpkin pie (used Paula Deen's recipe and it WAS mouthwatering), cook it, make the cupcake batter, pour it into liners, add the pies and bake. Then make the buttercreme.

I think these are in need of a do over. I may introduce my southern family to these at Christmas time this year.

Next: Almond Dream Cupcakes

On Hold: Amnesia Sparklecakes (waiting for my sister)

Tinkerbell Cupcakes - I did make these but due to time constraints they did not come out as decorative as I wanted.

Dannen O'Donnell Cupcakes

These were inspired by a character Kim created in her novel. I asked her if she were Dannen, what flavors would she like? The result was this monster. A chocolate cupcake with liquid salted caramel center topped with salted caramel buttercreme, crushed pretzels and salted caramel drizzle. Oh, the caramel was home made by the way. I used to hate making home made caramel but after a bit of practice, it comes out nice. I didn't add the buttercreme as the center because I thought it would be overwhelming. The caramel I did pour into the cupcake became absorbed by the cake. However it still worked. Will try next time to see if I can thicken it up.

Cut open. You can see the darker section inside the cupcake is where the caramel went. I wasn't so sure about the pretzels on the top but it really was good adding that crunch!

I hope to be making these again soon!

Pumpkin Cheesecake Cupcakes

Yes I know I deviated from my list of cupcakes for a bit here. Brother-in-law was in town and had to make them for him since his poor Hurricanes took a beating from the Seminoles (Go Noles!)

And I was shocked to hear he had never had pumpkin cheesecake! Blasphemy! This turned out really good and I can't wait to make other cheesecake cupcakes. I love this idea as opposed to a full cheesecake because you don't need to dirty my dishes to eat it. Oh, they also fit in the fridge nicely.



The crust is made from crushing pecans (you can toast them first too) and gingersnap. The center is of course pumpkin cheesecake. Then I made a home made vanilla whipped topping and sprinkled crushed pecans and gingersnap on top and drizzled it with caramel. I bet a chocolate drizzle would work well too....hmmm....think it's time to taste test that! :D