Monthly Archives: July 2009

I saw this post last week on Epicute.com, and immediately wanted to try making these cupcakes.  So yesterday afternoon I set a few hours aside to bake and decorate.  I wanted to try a new cake recipe out of Martha Stewart’s Cupcakes (a fantastic book for ridiculously good recipes and oodles of decorating ideas).  I chose a “Snickerdoodle Cupcake” recipe, which had a nice shot of cinnamon and sugar in the batter.  While the cupcakes were cooling (and our house officially smelled amazing), I set to work trying to recreate the white and red striped cups for the cupcakes to nestle into.  

I coated the inside of a foil cupcake liner with white chocolate, and then set them in the freezer.  The hard part was trying to carefully carefully carefully peel the foil away from the chocolate.  I attempted about 10 of these, and only got 6 or 7 passable ones.  The others cracked apart in the process.  I then melted some red candy coating and piped lines onto the white chocolate cups.  After I nestled in a cupcake into the candy cup, I piped on some vanilla buttercream frosting, tinted with a bit of yellow food coloring.  

And while far from perfect, I think a few came out pretty good, or at least close enough to see what I was going for!

I think cupcakes are becoming my favorite baked items to make in the kitchen.  I love the different ways to decorate them as well as the built-in “cuteness factor.”  These cupcakes were made to fill several different needs, but mainly to help our friends Diane and Aaron choose some flavors for their fast-approaching August wedding.

 This tray includes Chocolate Mint Cupcakes with Peppermint Buttercream Frosting, Chocolate Cupcakes with Whipped Peanut Butter Frosting, Chocolate Cupcakes with Vanilla Swiss Buttercream Frosting, Cherry Almond Cupcakes with Almond Buttercream Frosting, and Double Lemon Cupcakes with Lemon Curd and Lemon Buttercream Frosting.  

In my binders and cookbooks and files, I think I have at least 15 different chocolate chip cookie recipes.  And that is for plain-Jane, regular chocolate chip cookies.  Of those 15, I’ve narrowed it down to just one go-to recipe that I make consistently, and always love the result.  But today I was feeling a bit antsy, and felt like trying yet another new (to me) one, which I’ve had clipped from an old issue of Martha Stewart Living.  I tweaked the recipe a little bit, based on what I had on hand, and the fact that I’m not the biggest fan of walnuts in cookies – macadamia nuts sounded soooo much better when I spied them in the freezer.  And now I should say, this recipe is has a lot of similarities to my other favorite Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe, but the slight differences in amounts of sugar and type of flour changes the result in a way that I’m more partial to.  I like the caramelized sugar crunch on the edges of the cookie, with a remarkably tender, chewy interior.  And goodness gracious, those macadamia nuts make just about everything better!

Triple Chocolate Chip Macadamia Nut Cookies
adapted from Martha Stewart Living

2 cups plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter
1 cup plus 2 tablespoons firmly packed brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 large egg
1 large egg yolk
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup milk chocolate chips
1/2 cup white chocolate chips
1/2 cup bittersweet or semisweet chocolate chips
1 cup chopped macadamia nuts
Coarse Sea Salt

1. In a bowl, whisk together flour, slat, and baking soda; set aside.  In a medium saucepan over medium heat, melt butter.  Turn off heat and add both sugars; whisk until combined.  Transfer mixture to a medium bowl, and let cool to room temperature.
2. Whisk egg, egg yolk, and vanilla into butter mixture.  Fold in flour mixture until just combined.  Fold in chips and nuts.  Cover bowl with plastic wrap; refrigerate until firm, about 30 minutes.
3. Preheat oven to 325 degrees.  Using an ice cream or 1/4 cup cookie scoop, place golf-ball-size mounds of dough 3 inches apart on baking sheets.  Sprinkle a small amount of sea salt on top of each mound of dough. Bake until cookies are lightly golden brown and the tops no longer look wet, 12-15 minutes.  Allow cookies to cool on baking sheet for 5 minutes; transfer to a wire rack until completely cooled.  Store in an airtight container.

You want to know my least favorite line when reading through a recipe?  “Let cool completely before cutting.”  What kind of ridiculousness is that?!  They’re brownies, for heaven’s sake!  Peanut Butter Swirl Brownies!  It took every ounce of self-control just to get the pan with the batter into the oven.  And now I am supposed to wait until they are completely cooled?  I’m not Super Woman.

Chocolate batter.  Crimeny.

Peanut Butter filling.  Just a taste, please?

Swirling… (licking the knife is acceptable, right?)

oh-so-close to just digging into this with a spoon…

Finally… out of the oven!

But NO!

Directions tell me I have to wait to cut them until cooled.  I usually like following the rules.  I like the order, organization, and calm that results from following rules.

But this rule is dumb.

And now I need some milk!