Boston Creme Pie Cupcakes

I saw Boston Creme cupcakes somewhere the other day and decided to day that I would make them. I didn’t want to use egg yolks in my creme filling so I found a recipe that used cornstarch as a thickener. Otherwise, I used the recipe from Martha Stewart’s website for the cupcakes and the chocolate ganache topping.

I have to say, the Vanilla Pudding mix is probably the best I have ever had. The first batch I made of it did not come out right because I didn’t use enough of the warm milk mixture to heat up the corn starch. It ended up really lumpy and didn’t set up right. I did it a second time and it came out pretty amazing.

Boston Cream Pie Cupcakes
Adapted from Martha Stewart’s Boston Cream Pie Cupcakes
Serves 18

Ingredients
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup 2% milk
3 ounces (6 tablespoons) unsalted butter, softened
3 large eggs
1 cup sugar
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
Vanilla Cream
Chocolate-Ganache Glaze

Directions
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line one and a half cupcake tins with paper liners.
2. Whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt in a small bowl.
3. Start warming milk and butter in a saucepan over low heat.
4. Whisk eggs and sugar with a mixer on high speed until thick and pale, about 5 minutes.
5. Beat in dry ingredients.
6. Once the milk and butter come to a boil, add milk mixture to batter with the mixer on low speed. Beat until smooth.
7. Add vanilla.
8. Divide batter among cupcake cups, filling each a little more than halfway. Bake cupcakes until light gold, about 15 minutes. Let cool in tins for 10 minutes, then transfer to wire racks. Let cool.
9. Using an apple corer, take the center out of each cupcake once they are room temperature.

While the cupcakes cool, make the vanilla pudding for the center of the cupcakes. I changed a few things in this recipe as well. The biggest difference is that I halved the recipe!

Vanilla Pudding
Adapted from TheKitchn’s D.I.Y. Pudding
makes 2 cups

2 cups 2% milk
1/4 cup vanilla sugar
1/2 vanilla bean pod, sliced in half
2.5 Tablespoons cornstarch
Pinch of salt
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
1/4 teaspoon vanilla (optional)

1. Whisk the sugar into the milk and warm over low heat, stirring constantly. i added a half a vanilla bean pod from the vanilla sugar when I whisked in the sugar. This allowed the vanilla bean to steep in the milk while it came to a boil.
2. When bubbles appear around the edges, ladle a cup of the milk into a bowl with the cornstarch and beat the whisk until smooth.
3. Add cornstarch mixture back into the saucepan of milk and cook over low heat, stirring constantly, until it thickens.
4. Turn the heat to the lowest setting and cover the pot loosely. Let sit for about 10 minutes. Remove from the heat, uncover, and whisk in the butter and vanilla extract. Cool completely before filling the cupcakes.

While the pudding is cooling, make the chocolate ganache. The only thing I did differently was to use mini semi-sweet chocolate chips instead of chopping my own chocolate.

Chocolate Ganache Glaze
Adapted from Martha Stewart’s Chocolate-Ganache Glaze recipe
Makes 1 1/4 cups

Ingredients
2/3 cup heavy cream
6 ounces semisweet chocolate, finely chopped
1 tablespoon light corn syrup

Directions
Bring cream to a boil in a small saucepan. Remove from heat, and add chocolate and corn syrup. Let stand for 5 minutes. Whisk until smooth. Transfer to a bowl, and let cool, stirring often. Use immediately.

I was low on corn syrup so I ended up putting half a tablespoon of it into the ganache. It still poured nicely and was awesome.

Once everything is cooled to room temperature, you can begin to build them. I filled each cupcake with a teaspoon or 2 of the pudding. (there was a LOT leftover to eat on its own!) Once that was done, I poured a fat tablespoon of the chocolate ganache on top. I put them onto a baking sheet with a piece of Glad Press n Seal wrap under them for quick clean up. As you pour the ganache onto each cupcake, it will spill over the side. This is good! They look pretty awesome when that happens!

OK time for pics!

 

Horchata!

In honor of Cinco de Mayo (in a couple of days) I decided to make horchata cupcakes. Carter and I both really love to drink horchata. Last year, I made the same cupcakes but didn’t get enough pictures to write it up. This year, I measured all the ingredients out and found their weights as well as took lots of pictures of my candy set up. They came out just as adorable as they did last year and I am really excited to share them with the guys at his office tomorrow 😀

I got the recipe from my favorite cupcake website, as usual. Horchata Cupcakes were an experimental cupcake that Chockylit made. I didn’t go as far as she did with it because I used store bought horchata. (We like the Kern brand) Other than that, I followed her directions pretty exactly.

Horchata cupcakes
Adapted from Chockylit’s recipe: Horchata Cupcakes
makes 24 cupcakes / 350 degree oven

1 stick butter
1-1/2 cups (294g) sugar
2 cups (278g) all purpose flour
2 teaspoons (9g) baking powder
1/2 teaspoon (2g) salt
1 teaspoon (4g) cinnamon
1 cup fresh horchata
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
4 large egg whites

1. soften butter in the mixer on high speed
2. drizzle the sugar in with the butter and beat until light and fluffy, about 2-3 minutes
3. sift flour, baking powder, salt, and cinnamon together
4. mix the horchata and vanilla together
5. add the flour mixture and horchata mixture to the butter/sugar in 3 parts alternating between flour and horchata and beating well after each addition
6. set aside incorporated mixture
7. in a clean mixer bowl, beat egg whites until soft peaks form
8. fold egg whites into cake batter until incorporated
9. scoop batter into the prepared cupcake pans
10. bake in the 350 degree oven for approximately 20 minutes or until a cake tester comes out clean

Frosting
2 sticks butter, soft
1/2 cup fresh horchata
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
7-8 cups confectioner’s sugar

1. soften butter in the mixer on high speed
2. sift confectioner’s sugar
3. add horchata, vanilla, and 4 cups of confectioner’s sugar to the sugar and beat until combined
4. add remainder sugar 1 cup at a time until desired consistency/sweetness is reached

I ended up using 7 cups of confectioner’s sugar and I didn’t bother to sift it. Sometimes I do, and sometimes I am too lazy to do it. I don’t know if it makes much of a difference or not but most of the time it works either way 😀

The tacos on top of the cupcakes were a stroke of genius based upon the candies I had been using to do the fancy cupcakes from the Hello, Cupcake! book. I sat down one day and figured out what would work best for each component of a taco.

I used:
6 Kraft caramels (divided into 4)
2 Peach Guava Starburst fruit chews (From the Fiesta Pack)
2 Melon Berry Starburst fruit chews (From the Fiesta Pack)
1/2 cup Rice Krispies cereal
1/4 cup chocolate chips, melted
2 TBsp strawberry jam

Roll each piece of the divided caramel into a ball. Using a rolling pin, flatten the caramel quarters as thin as you can get them without sticking. I used a plastic, flexible cutting board for this because they were sticking to my wooden one as I was rolling them out. Try to keep them round when you do this step. (If you have trouble rolling out the caramels, you can nuke them in the microwave for 5 seconds. Any more than 5 seconds and they sort of melt into a puddle.) Don’t overlap the caramels once you roll them out because they will start to stick to each other!

For the cheese and lettuce, I cut the Starbursts into strips. For the lettuce, I flattened the pieces out and then sliced it to look like shredded lettuce. I started doing that for the cheese pieces but ended up cutting the strips into little squares because that resembled grated cheese better. I tried actually grating the cheese as well and that didn’t work out for me very well.

For the meat, melt the chocolate in the microwave until it is completely melted. Mix the cereal with the chocolate until it is coated evenly.

Everything is ready!

Caramels are done!

Lettuce and cheese!

To build the tacos you have to work a little quickly, otherwise the caramel starts to get soft and melt to your hands. Fold the caramel in half like a taco shell, and layer in the meat, cheese, then the lettuce. I did all of these placed them on top of the frosted cupcakes. I went back once they were all finished and topped each taco with a small amount of the strawberry jam.

OK Completed Pics!

I highly recommend these cupcakes and also making the tacos for the top. I think everyone is pretty excited when they see them. 😀