Cupcake Day for the RSPCA - Pupcakes!

As mentioned previously, Monday 17th August 2009 is Cupcake Day for the RSPCA. I decided to participate thanks to a bit of gentle persuasion from a certain person. I love the idea of it, it's such a cute and fun way to raise money and everyone can get involved. So I quickly registered to be a cupcake cook on their website, and received a Cupcake Kit in the mail a couple days later with posters and balloooons!

Since this was my first year participating, I had to go with the obvious cliche, animal cupcakes. Someone jokingly mentioned "You should do pupcakes!", and being the big cheesy person that I am, I just had to do it!

Many ideas were explored, but I decided to keep it simple. Lemon cupcakes adapted from my foolproof cupcake recipe, with maple cream cheese icing (a huge hit on top of my sweet potato cake recently).

The only extra bit of flair came from some persian fairy floss to make them a bit furry looking, an idea that came to me while enjoying dessert at the Gazebo Wine Garden, which included a fairy floss topped brownie. It was a bit fiddly, but each pupcake got its own unique hairstyle.

This one looks like a bit of an Einstein don't you think?

The thing that pleased me most was that these are really yummy, as well as looking super cute. A light, moist, crumbly cake with the heady scent of lemons and a smooth, rich icing with a hint of maple syrup. Hopefully everyone will think these make it worth forking out the money for a good cause!

Mmm marshmallowy...

Pupcakes!
(Adapted from my foolproof cupcake recipe)
2 eggs
125g unsalted butter, softened
3/4 cup caster sugar
225g self-raising flour (I usually make this by mixing plain flour and baking powder using the instructions on the baking powder pack if I don't have self-raising flour)
1 large lemon
1 mandarin
Cupcake papers

For the icing:
125g cream cheese, softened
200g icing sugar, sifted
1 tbsp maple syrup

For the decorations:
Brown m&ms (1 per cupcake)
Dark chocolate chips (2 per cupcake)
Strawberry Starburst Fruit Chews (about 1 for 3 cupcakes)
Optional: Persian fairy floss

Preheat oven to 180C and line a cupcake tray with paper cases. Zest lemon and set aside the zest. Juice lemon and top up with mandarin juice (if necessary) to obtain 1/3 cup juice. Cream butter and sugar together using an electric beater until light and smooth. Add eggs at a time and beat in well. Add the juice, lemon zest and flour and quickly mix until combined, avoid overmixing the flour.

Pour cake mixture in paper cases, filling them about half to two-thirds full. It's usually easiest to use a table spoon to scoop the batter and then drop it into your paper cases. Bake for about 20 minutes, or until the tops are dark golden brown and cakes are thoroughly cooked through. Cool for a couple minutes in the tray then remove carefully and cool completely on a wire rack.

When cakes are completely cooled (I baked them the night before), cut marshmallows in half for the noses of the pupcakes. Place half a marshmallow on close to the centre of each cupcake.

Beat the softened cream cheese in a large mixing bowl until smooth. Add the sifted icing sugar and beat until well combined. Add maple syrup and beat until combined. Use a small spatular or the back of a spoon to smooth the icing over the top of the cakes and over the marshmallow snouts.

Place a brown m&m on the top of the centre of each icing-covered marshmallow to finish off the puppy nose. Use two chocolate chips for the eyes.

Place a strawberry fruit chew between two sheets of baking paper and carefully flatten with a rolling pin to about a millimetre or so thick. Cut into the shape of a tongue and place underneath their marshmallow snouts.

Grab a tuft of persian fairy floss (can be bought from Persian grocery stores and the Essential Ingredient) and arrange above the eyes for the puppies hairdo. If you can't get this, you could also place half oreo cookies (to make ears) on the top of the cakes at the same time as the marshmallow and cover with icing.

Voila! You have puppie cakes! Some may have some dodgy haircuts, but oh well...they're pretty cute aren't they?

Pupcakes waiting for their eyes and hair...a bit creepy, no?

I'm a bit buggered since this took a lot longer than I thought it would. Me & my kitchen are covered in icing sugar and fairy floss but I think it was worth the effort!

So tomorrow I will be hauling these little pups into work, in an attempt to sell them to my poor workmates who have become quite used to getting my baked good for free! The only thing I can't decide is how much to charge for them. What do you reckon?

P.S If you like my pupcakes, click HERE to vote for it for the Creative Cupcake competition on the RSPCA website!

Sweet Potato Cake with Maple Cream Cheese Icing

This is officially my most favourite cake recipe ever. That is a big deal coming from me, because I've made a lot of cakes and I'm very picky about them. Before this I'd say banana was probably my absolute favourite, because if it's fabulous flavour, texture and moistness and I could eat toasted banana bread nearly everyday if I was able to. But this one wins hands down. I know, I can hear your doubts; sweet potato in a cake?! Really? How does that even work? This is exactly the type of scepticism I was met with whenever I mentioned this idea to any of my friends. But then I made it, and oh boy did they eat their words.

This cake was officially dubbed the 'I can't believe it's not Carrot Cake!" because its colour and moistness had so many people in the office convinced it was a really great carrot cake. There were gasps of shock and I think I even got a euphoric hug from a workmate after I explained the cake to them.

The cake on its own is not very sweet and surprisingly light and fluffy. You wouldn't expect it because it is a heavy mother of a cake. My tupperware was groaning with the weight of all the cake slices I stuffed into it. It's sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo moist and the exterior becomes amazingly crunchy and golden and I pretty much cut the entire top (err well the bottom since it was a bundt pan) and ate it straight out of the oven because it tasted so good. The maple syrup cream cheese icing was the perfect match for the cake. It was sweet and creamy and rich with the flavour of maple syrup. You could use the icing for anything, and I also think this entire recipe would make a fantastic cupcake.

Sweet Potato Cake with Maple Cream Cheese Icing
(based on this recipe from Epicurious)
For the cake:
2-3 fairly large red sweet potatoes (enough to make 2 cups cooked & mashed)
2 3/4 cups all purpose flour
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1 1/4 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
2 cups sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
4 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract

For the icing:
125g cream cheese, softened
200g icing sugar
1 tbsp maple syrup

Peel and chop your sweet potatoes into even sized chunks. Bring a medium pot of water to boil and boil the sweet potatoes until they are very tender (about 15 mins). Drain and mash well with a fork and then set aside to cool.

Preheat oven to 160°C (325°F). Sift flour, cinnamon, ginger, baking powder, baking soda and salt into medium bowl. Measure enough mashed sweet potatoes to equal 2 cups. Transfer to large bowl. Add sugar and oil to sweet potatoes; using electric mixer, beat until smooth. Add eggs 2 at a time, beating well after each addition. Add flour mixture; beat just until blended. Beat in vanilla.

Transfer batter to prepared pan. Bake cake until tester inserted near center comes out clean, about 1 hour 5 minutes. Cool cake in pan on rack 15 minutes.

Using small knife, cut around sides of pan and center tube to loosen cake. Turn out onto a wire rack and cool completely.

Prepare the icing while your cake cools; place cream cheese in a medium mixing bowl and beat with an electric mixer until smooth. Sift icing sugar into the mixing bowl and beat well. Add maple syrup gradually while continuing to beat the mixture until you reach the desired consistency.

It was about 1 tbsp of maple syrup for me but you can put more or less depending on how you prefer it. PLEASE don't use that horrible fake maple syrup stuff, I will cry if you do! Use a spatula to spread icing over the top of your cake.

Finally, drizzle about a teaspoon of extra maple syrup over the top of the icing. *Drool*

I think the only downside about the recipe is how long it took to bake, I got so impatient waiting for it that I must have tested it with a skewer about 15 times. I also couldnt resist slicing little bits off the bottom of it while waiting for it to cool because it was so yummy! The long baking time is why I'm going to try these as cupcakes next time :) It really surprised me how great the texture was considering all the sweet potato in it, it wasn't starchy at all and you could see little orange flecks of potato all through the cake. It's so moreish, I was originally going to share it with everyone in the office but several greedy friends of mine (and myself) ended up eating something like 3 pieces each! Oh well, as long as it was enjoyed thoroughly, it doesn't really matter!

Signature Dish Lunch at Chef Lex's

A signature dish. What makes a dish your signature dish? Chef Lex was holding a special lunch at his house to celebrate the launch of his very own blog, vue de cuisinier, and he asked all of us to bring our signature dish to share. My first thought was, 'Shit. I don't HAVE a signature dish. Do I?' This really bothered me, after all the damn cooking and baking I've done over the past few years, shouldn't I have a signature dish? This was pondered and pondered and pondered many times over until the weekend of the lunch, held at Lex's house, which had enviable water views and an even more enviable cookbook collection. Along with me was Shez, Suze, Richard and Simon.

I have major cookbook envy *steals*

Look, I knew straight away whatever I made was probably not going to be savoury. I am a lazy cook when it comes to savoury. I want it easy and quick with minimal ingredients and I haven't really gone past the basics and the hearty homey stuff. So I stayed in my comfortable baking zone and left the savouries up to everyone else. I was well-prepared with an empty stomach because I've been to enough food blogger meet-ups and read enough blog entries to know that there was going to be a lot of yummy food.

Salad and sourdough

Blue swimmer crab miso soup (Lex's recipe here)

Mmm this soup was really really lovely. Delicious crab & miso flavours and firm bits of seaweed, this was simple but impressive. Since he's posted up the recipe, I really want to make this myself! We also enjoyed some fresh oysters and fried haloumi and chorizo. Oh man, I am so addicted to haloumi at the moment, mostly thanks to David Tsirekas and that plate of haloumi was sitting right in front of me so I ate piece after piece.

Coffin bay oysters

It was particularly entertaining watching Richard hoover up about half of these oysters in about half a minute, haha now that's a champion stomach!

Chorizo and haloumi

I was shocked to find out the other day that my poor boyfriend had never heard of haloumi before so I had to run straight out and buy&fry him some. We are both a little bit addicted to it.

Cauliflower and broccoli soup with garlic infused olive oil and garlic bagel crumbs (Shez's recipe here)

You can read on Shez's blog about how this soup became her signature dish and after tasting it, it was easy to see why. Rich and creamy with a lovely contrast of colours from the vegetables and texture from those yummy garlic bagel crumbs, I could eat a lot of it!

Japanese bento

Simon unveiled his bento box and it was so fantastic looking and so cute with those little sauce bottles! Along with the pork and prawns there was salmon sashimi, and tamagoyaki (fried egg roll), lettuce and tomatoes. I particularly enjoyed the crunchy king prawns dipped in the Japanese mayo. I love Japanese mayo just a little bit too much. Richard's chicken marylands were so appealing and I happily sat there for ages working my way through one of those enormous pieces.

Tullabung pork tonkatsu & king prawn ebi furai

Honey soy chicken

Last of the savouries but definitely not the least, Chef Lex whipped up this brilliant dish of pork belly smoked with maple, including a wonderful glaze which included mandarins, star anise and cinnamon. My mouth started watering a teeny bit while watching him chop up the pork belly, the crackling made a very satisfying crack as it was broken up.

Lex chopping up his pork belly

Pouring the extra glaze over...mmm...

Maple smoked pork belly with szechuan mandarin glaze

Oh it was so good. Incredibly juicy with crunchy crackling and I really enjoyed the citrus, spices and sweetness from the glaze. Cinnamon and star anise are always winners with me! He also served this up with some creamy potato mash.

On to desserts! Haha it was finally time for me to contribute a bit to this feast. I have to admit I was a bit nervous and intimidated to be serving up my baked things to people other than the usual suspects. I was also super excited to try everything else on the table.

Chocolate & orange blossom water layer cake with pistachio cream, butterscotch pear insert and bitter chocolate ganache (Shez's recipe here)

Fig cheesecake and raspberry & white chocolate cheesecake

There was a huge selection of cakes to try, I loved the fig cheesecake that Richard brought and am determined to try baking one myself now. Shez's cake looked gorgeous and indulgent with all those layers.

Raspberry jam-filled toasted coconut cupcakes with white chocolate buttercream (my recipe here)

Eep, my turn. During my many moments of worrying about what to do for this lunch I mentioned it to my friend who jokingly said, "You should make raspberry cupcakes, har har!" And then I thought, why not? I know, cupcakes are not very exciting and not very technical, but they are what I've done the most and what my friends seem to know me for so why not? I had minor disaster making these, but more on that later.

Cocoa nib biscuits with salted dulce de leche (my recipe here)

I also couldn't resist pulling out my new favourite recipe, the salted dulce de leche biscuits. This time I reduced the amount of cocoa so they were less bitter and I was pretty happy with their taste and texture. Unfortunately it was just way too hard to make them open faced like the original recipe, because I would have no way of transporting those sticky bastards. So they were sandwich biscuits this time, which sort of survived the trip, but were oozing out and sticking to everything a bit by the end of it.

Dulce de leche brownies (Suze's recipe here)

Just in case you weren't completely sure whether we were fans of sweetened condensed milk, Suze's brownies should make that obvious. Oh these were so sweet and SO good. Biting into a section that had a big glob of dulce and I was in happy land. I wish I could have fit more of these in my tummy!

Frozen kiwi lollies

A final sweet treat from Lex were these adorable frozen kiwi fruit on little sticks. Fun, cute and yummy, I thought there were a little bit of genius. It was a sweet way to finish a yummy day of eating. A huge thankie to Chef Lex for hosting the party at his place, and go check out his blog please!

Oh and before I forget, the minor disaster with my cupcakes was that I was an idiot who left icing the cupcakes until early on the morning of the lunch and in my sleepy state managed to hugely stuff up the white chocolate buttercream and so I had to remake it and it was still a bit runny and too buttery. I realised later it was probably because I used thickened cream instead of single cream, it was all I had in the fridge. Dammit! I had a lot of left over white chocolate buttercream to eat my way through after that.

Oh well, I hope they tasted okay, I was reasonably happy with how they looked (except for the some of the stupid frozen raspberries which 'bled' on the icing and made them look a bit creepy), including these gorgeous Vestli House cupcake paper samples that I had sent to me thanks to Meaghan of Cupcake House. Thanks again Meaghan :) I'm still not completely sure if cupcakes are my 'signature dish', maybe give me a year and I'll get back to you.