Baking Challenge: Whiteout Cupcakes

Prior to yesterday, I hadn't baked in almost two weeks. I was feeling up to a difficult baking challenge, so I cracked open my Baked cookbook. For whatever reason, Baked has the hardest recipes in them. Almost all of them span multiple pages, have countless (and very expensive) ingredients, and utilize baking techniques I've never even contemplated before, much less used. Out of all the recipes in Baked, I've only tackled two of the recipes - the Sweet & Salty cake (twice, the first time was a disaster that produced a frosting flecked with chunks of butter) and the brownies (delicious, but they contained about $15 worth of quality chocolate).

Cupcake with the Baked cookbook

I picked the whiteout cake because it seemed like something that would appeal to a lot of people. We recently moved to a new office and I now work with more people than I used to. Which just means more people to eat my baked goods, an exciting prospect for me.



The first thing that gave me pause with this recipe was that the liquid in the cake batter was ice water. It's usually milk, cream, buttermilk...something more substantial than water. I went along with this, finished the batter and popped the cupcakes in the oven. While the cupcakes were cooling, I started on the frosting. The first step was to melt white chocolate on a double boiler. Easy enough. Then the next step said to combine white sugar, flour, milk and heavy cream on the stove until it thickened and boiled. Flour?? In a frosting? I guess I got distracted by that thought because somehow I let my first attempt at this burn. The second attempt turned out much better. After that mixture cooled, I gradually added an unspeakable amount of butter, small pieces at a time, and then the melted white chocolate. The result was a lighter, smoother frosting than my typical frostings. I liked it a lot and they were a big hit in the office today.

I'm looking forward to trying more Baked recipes this fall; for whatever reason, I feel they're more cool weather desserts. I'm also going to try to make the trek to Baked in Brooklyn this fall...I've been dying to get there for over a year now.

Cupcake Obsessed's Male Readers

One of the biggest surprises for me since starting this blog is the discovery that boys enjoy this blog almost as much as the girls do. I'm constantly surprised when guys admit their secret (or not-so-secret) obsession with my blog.


One of these awesome guys is my friend's roommate Howard frequently checks out my blog and always has the nicest things to say about my latest cupcakes. His girlfriend's birthday was last week and he wanted to take cupcakes with him up to Boston when he visited for her birthday weekend.


After some discussion about what kind I should make, we decided on chocolate with raspberry filling and chocolate ganache. I absolutely love the combination of chocolate and raspberry together. I had these great new pink cupcake liners from NY Cake that I used as well. Because they were greaseproof, I figured they would lock in the moisture and keep the cupcakes fresher for the weekend trip.

Happy Birthday, Kate!

Yesterday was one of my best friends' birthdays, and in honor of it, I made her a cake disguised as a giant margarita. After seeing this cake on Frosted Garden a couple months ago, I knew immediately that I would be making it for Kate's birthday.

Before adding the final layer of frosting

I had seen these giant margarita glasses before at Michael's (craft store) and picked one up a couple weeks ago to prepare for the cake. I had meant to bring my smallest Pyrex bowl home with me from Hoboken to Toms River, but completely forgot it. Fortunately, after rummaging through my grandmother's cabinets, I found a glass bowl that seemed to be the right size.


After deciding on funfetti cake with vanilla frosting (seemed to be an appropriate "birthday flavor"), I baked the cake for what felt like forever. I'm so used to cupcakes and their short baking time that a deep cake like this tested my patience. Especially since I couldn't wait for this to come out of the oven so I could take a nap.

No Kate, you can't drink that

After the cake baked and cooled, I made some vanilla frosting, tinted it light green, and frosted the bottom and sides of the glass. This part was the trickiest because I had to make sure that you didn't see any spatula lines through the glass. I cut the rounded-bottom cake in half, placed the bottom half in the glass, filled in a layer of frosting on top of it, and then topped it off with the other cake half and another layer of frosting to complete the cake. I added a hot pink straw and a slice of lime to complete the look.

18 Burgers, Hold the Fries

These started out as a request for a hamburger cake, but after seeing the burger cupcakes posted by Bakerella, I knew they had to be cupcakes. I have a clear preference for cupcakes over cake (and actually for all things miniature), and these were just too cute.

Cupcake "buns" waiting for assembly

To make these, I made 18 vanilla cupcakes. Once they were baked and cooled, I cut them each in half to form the "bun." The tops were a bit sticky after being stored in an airtight container overnight, and I sprinkled a tiny bit of sesame seeds over the top so they looked authentic. I also baked a batch of brownies in a rectangle pan. Using a 2" cutter, I cut out 9 brownie circles and cut each of these in half lengthwise to form the "hamburger patties."

Assembled cupcakes

After using a bit of frosting to adhere the lower bun to the brownie, I divided the remaining frosting into 3 bowls and dyed it green (lettuce), red (ketchup) and yellow (mustard). The frosting then got piped onto the brownie, and the rest of the vanilla cupcake was placed on top.

Box of burgers

Throughout the process of assembling these, my dad was sitting at the kitchen table watching me make them. The whole time, he kept saying "I just don't understand how these are going to look like burgers..." Finally when they were all put together, he goes, "WOAH! Those look exactly like hamburgers." Mission accomplished.

Cupcakes to Accompany Beer

Every year friends of my family host a huge beer pong tournament in August. Everyone partners up, comes up with a creative name, and competes based on their seeding. This is hands down one of my favorite events of every summer, and this year was no different. I was partnered with my sister Melissa, and we settled on the team name MC Hammered. I have to give Melissa credit because she pulled our whole awesome team uniform together.

MC Hammered

While Melissa was running around finding Hammer pants and choreographing our victory dance, I was busy baking 6 dozen cupcakes to bring to the party. After much debate, I settled on Irish car bomb (what better than cupcakes baked with beer for this event), vanilla, and cherry vanilla. The cherry vanilla is my favorite, and I was happy to have an excuse to make them again.

Cupcakes before most were taken

The cupcakes got set up well after the tournament was underway and most of them disappeared as I was setting them up on the stand. I had to keep shooing people away in order to set them all up and take a picture.

Dunkaroos enjoying their cupcakes

Although MC Hammered did not win the whole tournament (we actually were out in the 1st round), we did win the prize for best team name/uniform, which I consider a major victory.

Happy Birthday, Eric!

Last week it was my brother Eric's 23rd birthday. If you read the comments on this blog, he's the one always talking about the calorie content of cupcakes or making fun of our little sister, Melissa, for eating too many. See, Melissa and I are normal, cupcake-loving people, but Eric's strange and doesn't eat really anything that's bad for you. His ideal cupcake would probably be a mix of chicken, tuna, and protein powder.

Workspace around 1:00 am

Having decided that was not going to be my ingredient list, I went for a banana cupcake with peanut butter frosting. And I used no butter. Which is no small feat for me being as I use that stuff by the pounds. I also reduced the sugar in the cake. This was just about the "healthiest" cupcake I've baked yet. I also made a dozen regular vanilla for the people who wouldn't prefer the protein cupcakes.

Finished cupcakes

I really don't like bananas, but the banana cupcake wasn't bad at all. It definitely had more of a muffin texture, but that's probably due to the absence of butter. The combo of peanut butter and banana was good; each flavor held its own nicely.

Close-up of the suits cupcakes

Because Eric was having his birthday celebration down in Atlantic City, I went with a poker theme for the cupcakes. I covered the peanut butter banana cupcakes in rolled green fondant to look like a poker table and topped them with edible fondant poker chips I hand made and painted with gold luster dust. The vanilla cupcakes were covered in white fondant and topped with a card suit cut out of red and black fondant. I actually bought those fondant cutters about two months ago in preparation for these cupcakes. I also found tiny suit sprinkles at NY Cake and used those on the white cupcakes as well.

Poker chip cupcakes

All of this baking and decorating went down around midnight last Thursday. By the time I finished, I was exhausted and covered in corn starch (you roll the fondant on it).

About to sing Happy Birthday

Fortunately, when Eric and his friends returned from Atlantic City, most of them had won. It would not have been good to have a cupcake reminder of the big losses suffered at the poker tables.

Cupcakes for Birthdays

These liners even say they're for parties on the packaging

I just got done with the poker-themed cupcakes I made for my brother's birthday this weekend. I'll post those later, but for now I have pictures of cupcakes I made for a birthday party last weekend. I hate showing up to any kind of occasion with empty hands, and this party was for a birthday, so I definitely needed to bake cupcakes.

Purple cookie dough

I've had these fun cupcake liners from Reynold's that I picked up in the grocery store near me a while ago. They're good to use in my parents' oven because they're not greaseproof, so they don't slip away from the cupcake, but are still more fun than basic white. There was some purple ones, and I baked cookie dough cupcakes in them and dyed the chocolate chip frosting light purple to match the liner. I also baked a dozen margarita cupcakes into the pink & green argyle wrappers.

Margarita cupcake - Matches the liner!

These cupcakes were a pretty big hit at the party. I'm excited to see if Reynold's or any other supermarket brand puts out more decorative liners in the future.

Box of cupcakes, ready to go to the party

The Cupcakes I Almost Dropped on the Port Authority Floor

Due to time constraints and other plans this weekend, I had to bake an order that was due in Toms River Saturday on Friday in Hoboken. I left my apartment early Saturday morning in order to make it down in time, anticipating shore traffic that I did eventually hit.

Cupcakes, post near-fall and frosted in Toms River

While I was standing on line for the bus to Toms River, I reached into my bag to grab my bus ticket while balancing the heavy box of two dozen cupcakes in one hand. As I was just about to grasp my ticket, I lost my balance, and the box began wobbling out of my control. I immediately panicked, fearing these cupcakes would soon be scattered on the floor in front of me. For those of you who have never been to Port Authority (which is possible now that my blog has visitors from 37 countries and 45 U.S. states!! - yay!), it is by far one of the dirtiest places I have been. In all my years of traveling through Port Authority, I have never once witnessed anyone mopping the floor. I suppose there's no point though being as pigeons and other creatures are plentiful in the terminals.

Safe, secure, boxed and ready to go

If these cupcakes had hit the floor, it would have been nothing short of a disaster. I'd have to toss the infected cupcakes, and after that, I'm not sure what I would do. Probably cry for the entire bus ride and quit baking forever. Okay, maybe not that severe, but I would have had to show up with something at 1:00 pm at the person's house expecting a dozen Oreo and a dozen toasted coconut cupcakes. I'm wondering if Entenmann's would work in a pinch. Fortunately by some crazy maneuvering that pulled no less than 10 muscles in my back, I regained a grip on the cupcakes, and no cupcakes were injured in the process. Because they weren't yet frosted, it didn't even matter they all got jumbled in the box. This was extraordinarily lucky. The cupcakes arrived in TR unharmed and ready to be frosted.

Lessons Learned (White Chocolate Strawberry Cupcakes)

I learned a very important lesson this morning. I will never again put a container of cupcakes on my lap while wearing a pretty silk dress. I have since realized that the outside of the container is likely to have traces of frosting on it which will undoubtedly leave oil marks on the dress. This was a major bummer this morning.

Folding the strawberries and white chocolate into the batter

I had baked these white chocolate strawberry cupcakes last night for a coworker's birthday today. I started with my basic vanilla recipe and once it was mixed, added some white chocolate chunks and diced fresh strawberries. The frosting I used is white chocolate buttercream with fresh strawberries. These were seriously good, despite the melting issues they encountered in the heat.

Cupcakes fresh out of the oven, unfrosted

When I was younger, white chocolate was my favorite type of chocolate. Every Easter I'd get a white chocolate bunny in my Easter basket, that I probably ate that morning for breakfast (are you getting the sense I'm a healthy eater?). I was pretty surprised years later when I learned white chocolate actually has no cacao in it. It's just cocoa butter, milk solids, and sugar.

Finished cupcake on my desk, slightly melted

Medical Cupcakes

For the record, these cupcakes were approved by a (future) physician. A lot of people (namely my brother) often request cupcakes that are "healthy," but I'm conscientiously opposed to low-fat baked goods. They just never taste even slightly as good as the unmodified versions. Another thing is, how often do people really eat cupcakes? I mean, aside from me, cupcakes are a once in a while indulgence. And you shouldn't skimp calories on your indulgences. The diet can wait until Monday (or Tuesday...or Wednesday). Trust me.

Red velvet with a mini stethoscope

Ok, off that spiel now. This past weekend I baked 5 dozen cupcakes for a graduation party that was occurring on Saturday. The son of my parents' friends was graduating college and heading to medical school in St. Maarten. Why didn't I think of that when I was graduating college? Maybe not the med school, but definitely grad school in the islands.

Box of medical cupcakes

I know I've been talking about my summer time baking (bad) habits, and this bunch went just about the same. After returning home around 10:30 am from the night before, I went straight to making mini fondant stethoscopes to adorn the cupcakes. When it was evident the fondant wasn't going to work for the tube portion of the stethoscope, somehow through my hangover-induced haze, I was able to improvise and whip up some royal icing to replace, while baking the last dozen cupcakes. After finally getting the full five dozen baked, frosted, stethoscoped and boxed, I was immediately out the door to drop these off.

Full cupcake tower

The full order was for 2 dozen red velvet with the stethoscopes, 1 dozen Irish Car Bomb cupcakes, 1 dozen chocolate with chocolate ganache, and 1 dozen orange cupcakes with vanilla bean frosting. I thought it was a pretty good assortment for a party with a mix of adults, 20-somethings, and kids.

Also, it's worth mentioning a friendship was almost lost in the baking of these cupcakes. SOMEONE who will remain nameless (Morgan) promised she'd bring me a bagel & Diet Snapple and never showed up with it. I will let it slide this time, but don't let it happen again! You should know better than to mess with me when I am baking hungover. Tears were almost shed when no bagel arrived at my door.

Irish Car Bomb Cupcakes (Minus the Whiskey)

For a graduation party request I baked this weekend, one of the flavors they asked for was chocolate Guinness cupcakes with Bailey's frosting. The party was on Saturday, and I knew I would never get everything baked on time if I waited until Friday night to start (especially since I knew I would be going out with friends Friday night). Because of this, I started the baking before leaving Hoboken for the weekend. This was a crucial call, especially being as I struggled to complete the order as it was.

Guinness post-explosion, still foaming at the top

There's a convenience store named Delite two blocks away from me that has been my go-to place for all of my pre and mid baking needs. I am terrible when it comes to running out of ingredients in the midst of mixing, and these store owners have seen me in various states of panic, desperately running in for eggs, cocoa powder, etc. Last Thursday, I stopped into Delite pre-baking to pick up some eggs and Guinness. The cashier looked horrified when I insisted I could just put the Guinness in my purse to carry home (it was raining really hard and I just didn't have enough hands).

Butter melting into the Guinness - two delicious ingredients

Not surprisingly, when I went to open one of the cans to use for the recipe, it exploded all over me & my kitchen. Excellent way to start the whole baking process. After finishing the Guinness cupcakes, I still needed to make plain chocolate cupcakes and realized that I had no milk in the apartment. Running back out to Delite, I realized in a mix of slight amusement and embarrassment that I not only was covered in a fine layer of flour, but also reeked of alcohol from the Guinness explosion that occurred. Standing as far back from the register as possible, I quickly paid for my milk and ran out of the store, praying the cupcakes I had left unattended in the oven hadn't burnt down my apartment. I got back and the cupcakes were perfectly baked, there were no fires, and I had all the ingredients needed for the rest of the night.

Buying mini bottles of alcohol always makes me feel like an alcoholic for some reason

I don't have any pictures of these cupcakes on their own, but in the next couple days I'll post all the cupcakes from the weekend and you can see the Car Bomb ones set up on the stand with the others.

Mardi Gras Cupcakes

The last of the cupcakes I made last weekend were for my parents' annual summer party. Their summer party is an event both their friends and my friends look forward to every year. Because my mom loves themes, this year's theme was Mardi Gras. I knew I wanted to do flashy cupcakes to go with the theme. I also knew I was likely going to be hungover from Friday night and needed to keep them simple. Hence, I went with all vanilla cupcakes with edible glitter in green, gold, and purple.

Cupcakes waiting to be set up after they were baked

Sure enough, Saturday morning I was not in good shape. The night before my best friend's brother got married and we all took full advantage of the open bar (sorry Mr. & Mrs. O!). I stumbled out of bed some time in the late morning and got to working. With the oven on, the kitchen was hot and it felt like I was sweating vodka. This was not one of my finest baking experiences.

Top tier of my new stand!

When they were finally done and sprinkled with the glitter, I set them aside for the party later that night. After I got ready, I accidentally dragged my arm through some of the spilt glitter, which quickly migrated all over me, making it look like I applied body glitter. I haven't worn body glitter since 1995, so I was pretty unhappy about that.

Set up in the "desserts room" as my friend used to call our dining room

Morgan's mom made me a new cupcake stand so that was on display at the party. The party was great and the cupcakes were a hit. By the time they actually came out with the rest of desserts, almost half of the cupcakes were already pilfered in secret by the party guests.

Bachelorette Party Cupcakes

In the past couple months, I have received several requests for cupcakes for bachelorette parties. Immediately upon hearing this request, I think, "oh no, no erotic cupcakes." My cupcakes are supposed to be pretty, not have fondant genitals on them. Not to mention, one of these requests was from a coworker where I would have to bring them into work. I'm sure my company's HR department has never even contemplated that nightmare of someone bringing erotic cupcakes into work. Or maybe they have...it's a pretty big company.

Red Velvet Cupcake

Fortunately, everyone I have dealt with wants pretty cupcakes, not raunchy ones. This weekend I made 2 dozen cupcakes for my brother's friend to to take to a bachelorette party she was going to. She wanted a dozen red velvet and a dozen cookie dough, specially made pink.

Packaged Cupcakes

I had some hot pink edible glitter I had picked up a while ago at NY Cake, a cake supply store in Chelsea, and I used that on the red velvet cupcakes. I dyed the cream cheese frosting a very light pink color and sprinkled the glitter over it. Very nice effect. For the cookie dough cupcakes, I dyed the frosting a darker pink before adding in the mini chocolate chips. I thought the end result of the cupcakes was very pretty - perfect for a girls' night out!

Cupcake Jars from Last Week

The cupcakes in jars idea has solved the whole dilemma of shipping cupcakes. Since my friend Dan's request, I've shipped out several more boxes of cupcakes. Last week a friend of mine asked me to send half a dozen to her friend as a gift. The recipient is the co-chair of 80 Million Strong, a coalition advocating for jobs for millenials. Because of this, my friend wanted rainbow cupcakes in the organization's colors - blue, red, orange and green - with green star sprinkles on top.

Cupcakes fresh out of the oven

I may have mentioned this before, but when it comes to my cupcakes, I'm an obsessive perfectionist. I was able to find multicolored star sprinkles, so I picked out the green ones individually much to the astonishment and dismay of my mom who watched this.

Finished cupcakes, before lids

I really liked the way the rainbow cupcakes looked in the clear jars - very pretty. The rainbow jars are something I'd like to experiment more with in the future.

Carefully selected sprinkles

Happy Birthday Jackie!

Today was one of my favorite coworkers' birthdays, and I knew I wanted to make her cupcakes for it. After unsuccessfully trying to stealthily figure out her favorite flavor, I decided to go with just plain vanilla cupcakes. For some reason, when I think birthday cake (or cupcakes), vanilla immediately pops to mind. Probably because it's my favorite flavor. I feel like birthday cupcakes need sprinkles too.

Standard cupcakes on my desk shot

Having no sprinkles in my apartment (yes, I know, it's shocking), I decided to decorate with some of the new tiny silver dragees I bought a while back. Dragees are balls of sugar covered with a metallic coating. There was some confusion with me for a while whether these were safe to eat because on the bottle I first bought it said "For decoration purposes only." After some intense research (aka Wikipedia), I discovered that while the FDA does not consider these edible, they are perfectly safe for you to eat. I have tested this personally myself. Apparently they used to be made with mercury finishing, which is not safe to eat, but they no longer contain mercury. Despite this, they are still banned in California.

The piping tip I used kind of made them look like roses

Have I mentioned my apartment kitchen does not have air conditioning? Halfway through this baking process, I was dying and sure that the frosting was just going to melt clear off the cupcake.

Jackie with the cupcakes!

I then made it to work today with my dozen pink birthday cupcakes with edible silver sprinkles despite also juggling my backpack (yay - my weekend starts today!) and purse and attempting to feed money into the bus machine. I would have sworn I was going to drop the cupcakes upon getting on the bus.

Jackie looked pretty surprised when I handed these over this morning. Hopefully it was a look of good surprise, not a look of "wow, pink is my LEAST favorite color" surprise.

Chocolate Ganache

In addition to the rainbow cupcakes I made for 4th of July this past weekend, I also baked 2 dozen for a friend's family party they were having. It was an order for 12 red velvet (which remains the leading favorite) and 12 vanilla with chocolate ganache. When I first heard they wanted chocolate ganache with vanilla cake, I was a bit thrown off guard. Ganache is the smooth, shiny cake coating that is comprised of dark chocolate and heavy cream. It's also frequently paired with chocolate cake.

Cupcake from 4th of July

The only other time I had made chocolate ganache was for my housewarming party last October. I had made four different types of mini cupcakes (which was crazy considering all the other things I had to do) - chocolate with chocolate ganache and Halloween sprinkles, caramel apple, red velvet, and orange vanilla.

Tower of cupcakes from last year's housewarming - Chocolate ganache in middle

There were a couple extra vanilla/chocolate ganache cupcakes left over from the batch so I got to try them. I think I'd label these as cupcakes for adults. Before you get any ideas, I don't mean that kind of "adult" cupcake - I've had so many requests lately for cupcakes for bachelor and bachelorette parties lately with inappropriate cupcake toppers. I mean in that the taste is more sophisticated, probably due to the quality chocolate in the ganache and the absense of traditional frosting. These are definitely the cupcakes I would serve at a dinner party.

4th of July Weekend

I always feel like 4th of July is the turning point in the summer. It's generally when summer starts to take its course and establishes how the remaining summer months are going to be. Fortunately we had some good weather down at the shore and a lot of good times over the past weekend.

In honor of the holiday, I put together some red, white & blue rainbow cupcakes. Over the course of the whole weekend, I toted my cupcake carrier around from bbq to bbq. By Monday, almost all of the cupcakes were gone.