Coconut Pecan Frosting with Devils Food Cupcakes [sms]

This week's Sweet Melissa Sundays pick, Coconut Pecan Frosting, was chosen by a great friend, Eliana of A Chica Bakes.

I remember when I was travelling to New York, Eliana gave me some great tips and pointers for going there. I'm super sorry that we were not able to meet up anything, but I'll be back in New York in March with my best friend for Spring Break. We'll be partying it up and eating some delicious foods.

I do want to apologize to everyone for not posting for a while. School and recruiting has been taking over my life lately, but I have some extra time this weekend because I don't have midterms until next week. I had a date this weekend, one of many since my ex and I broke up. He decided to cook me dinner while I made him these cupcakes with this topping. He loved it. I made the Devil's Food cupcakes from a mix, but doctored it up. I used this recipe for Chocolate Rum Cake because I had some Malibu lying around...well because my friend Elan is awesome and bought me some when I was super depressed.

Anyways, back to my blog, I've been trying to get myself back into baking, and I'll attempt to make something weekly. Wish me luck!

Coconut Custard Pie [sms]

This week's Sweet Melissa Sundays pick, Coconut Custard Pie, was chosen by Ruby of I Dream of Baking. This is the first recipe I've made in a while since I've been busy with ice cream cupcakes. I apologize to Tess and Carmen, but I hope that I can make those recipes soon! Now that I'm on "vacation" in Southern California, I don't exactly know how much I'll be baking. I should be back in Berkeley by the first full week of June - I got to start moving into my new apartment a couple blocks from my current one.

This pie was made on the same day the Pina Colada cupcakes were made. I used the same whipped cream and topped it off with some toasted coconut.

I actually don't know how it tasted because at the party, everyone had the cupcakes, but no pie. I hope that everyone else tasted their pie and hope it was amazing!

Make sure to check out the rest of the SMS bakers on the blogroll.

Pina Colada Cupcakes

So, in honor of my friend's 22nd birthday, I made these Pina Colada cupcakes. I was planning on making some margarita cupcakes because he's Mexican, but I couldnt find the necessary items before making it all.

I was searching the web for an easy way to make them. Some required 5 eggs, while others were in the metric system which made it a lot harder for me to convert over. Finally I found one that used a box mix. Typically, I don't like using box mixes, but the kickback was planned the night before and I just didn't have the time for effort to make the cupcakes from scratch. I topped these cupcakes off with a rum whipped cream and some toasted coconut.

I brought them to the party and everyone loved them! My friends said that you could taste the rum a bit in the cupcake and in the whipped cream - not enough to make it taste like alcohol though.

Pina Colada Cupcakes:
[adapted from Betty Crocker and iheartcuppycakes]

Cupcake:
1 box of yellow or white cake mix
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1/4 cup + 2 tablespoons rum
1 can [8oz] crushed pineapple in juice, undrained
3 eggs
1/3 cup shredded coconut
Directions:
Preheat oven at 350F. Line cupcake pan with cupcake liners.
Add 2 tablespoons of rum to the pineapple and let sit for a couple of minutes.
Mix together cake mix, oil, 1/4 cup rum, and eggs.
Take 2 tablespoons of the pineapple juice rum mixture out for the whipped cream.
Mix in the pineapple and shredded coconut.
Place about 2 tablespoons of batter for each cupcake. [For easier placing, spray the tablespoon with Pam or soak it in vegetable oil.]
Bake for about 15 minutes. Cool in pan.

Whipped Cream:
1.5 cup of heavy whipping cream
2 tablespoons of pineapple juice rum mixture from above
2 tablespoons of granulated sugar
Directions:
Whip all three until stiff peaks form, about 5-10 minutes.

Toasted Coconut:
shredded coconut either cooked over stove top or baked in the oven until toasted.

To assemble:
Take the cupcake and using 1M or other star tip, pipe the whipped cream onto the cupcake. Add some toasted coconut on top and ENJOY!

Giant Dulce de Leche Samoas

These imitation Samoas were some of the most labor intensive cookies I made. My cookie cutter was a 2.5 in one so I decided to make giant ones. In addition, my boyfriend's favorite Girl Scouts Cookie is Samoas - perfect! [personally, I like thin mints better!] These were delicious!

Coconut Cupcakes [msc]

Coconut cupcakes just were a sea of white in the Martha Stewart book. I remember looking at it and thinking where am I going to get these nice looking almond flakes from? What am I even going to bake the for? I can't just randomly make them and bring them to a meeting...or can I?

I had persuaded a friend of mine, Kevin, who I have made multiple cupcakes for, to drive me down to UC San Diego which is only about 75 or so miles from here. I know that my friends from Berkeley Circle K were going down as well.

I had made these the day of the meeting starting at about 11am and was done with everything at about 2pm. I rushed over to my friend Kevin's place and totally locked my keys into the car. Then we waited for AAA and then we got my keys out and were ready to go to San Diego!

It was pretty fun. I just hung out with my friends until the meeting and then meeting and then afterwards we got Mexican food. SO YUMMY. REAL MEXICAN FOOD.

I had made a couple of changes in this recipe. First I added a little more shredded coconut into the batter. Also, I made a coconut syrup with the leftover coconut milk (since I really had no use for it). I had put this syrup in the middle of the cupcake by cutting a hole and filling that with the syrup. Afterwards, I topped it with the seven minute frosting, but I had made the regular version and 1/6th of the recipe printed. In addition, I topped it with more shredded coconut! It was just a explosion of coconut flavor.

My friends had appreciated and most of them really enjoyed it. I hope to see my San Diego friends more!

WHOA. blurry, but that's okay!

The recipe for this month's Cupcake Club is found on pages 28-29 of Martha Stewart's Cupcake book. Thanks to Jennifer from Cinema Cupcakes for choosing this.

ps. I had written this blog post much before the Haiti tragedy had happened. My thoughts are with these people. It is truly a tragedy. I wish I was able to donate as much as other bloggers, but alas, being in college prevents that.

Coconut Cupcakes

Saturday night - what is a regular college kid doing? Most likely at a frat party, getting drunk.

Unlike them, I'm at a kickback, not drinking. It's like a kickback-housewarming party. So I asked the hosts what they wanted me to bring out of the two choices - coconut cupcakes or rootbeer float cupcakes. Two out of the three wanted coconut cupcakes so I went with that.

This was really simple to put together. It was just basically throwing everything together and I really enjoyed that because I am sick and I just can't stand anything too hard.

It was simple - just mix everything and into the oven it goes. While I was waiting for the cupcakes to finish baking, I whipped together the cream cheese frosting. Very simple, very tasty.

While waiting for the cupcakes to cool, I just put the frosting into the freezer. That's how I make sure that my frosting is pipe-able. I stirred every once in a while to make sure that frosting was not freezing too much.

Recipe:
[found here]
/2 sticks (3/4 cup) unsalted butter, room temp
1 cup sugar
3 eggs
3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
3/4 teaspoon almond extract
1 1/2 cups flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 cup buttermilk
7 ounces sweetened, shredded coconut [I had toasted it]

Frosting
1/2 pound (1 8-oz. pkg.) cream cheese, room temp
1 1/2 sticks (3/4 cup) unsalted butter, room temp
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon almond extract
3/4 pound confectioners' sugar, sifted

Directions:
Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F.
Cream the butter and sugar on high speed until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes.
With the mixer on low speed, add the eggs, 1 at a time, scraping down the bowl after each addition.
Add the vanilla and almond extracts and mix well.
In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
In 3 parts, alternately add the dry ingredients and the buttermilk to the batter, beginning and ending with the dry.
Mix until just combined.
Fold in 3 1/2 ounces of coconut [I basically took a little more than half and put it into the batter]
Line a muffin pan with paper liners.
Fill each liner to the top with batter. [I put two tablespoons in]
Bake for 25 to 35 minutes [mine were done in 15], until the tops are brown and a toothpick comes out clean.
Allow to cool in the pan for 15 minutes.
Remove to a baking rack and cool completely.
Meanwhile, make the frosting. Cream together the cream cheese, butter, and vanilla and almond extracts.
Add the confectioners' sugar and mix until smooth.
Frost the cupcakes and sprinkle with the remaining coconut.

I also topped mine with these coconut M&M's I found at the local supermarket. SUPER FUN!