Chocolate Salted-Caramel Mini Cupcakes

I have been wanting to make these babies for awhile now!  Oh my goodness, so worth the work!  The recipe makes a LOT, so make sure you have a crowd.  They are filled with salted caramel and topped with a dark chocolate frosting.  Sprinkle with sea salt if you like.  I did half with sea salt sprinkled on top and half left without...and they were all gone so not sure which people liked better.  That means they must have been good, right?

 

Here is how you make them:

Ingredients

Cupcakes
• 1 ½ cups all-purpose flour
• ¾ cup unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder
• 1 ½ cups granulated sugar
• 1 ½ teaspoons baking soda
• ¾ teaspoon baking powder
• ¾ teaspoon salt
• 2 large eggs
• ¾ cup buttermilk
• 3 tablespoons vegetable oil
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• ¾ cup warm water

Salted Caramel filling
• 2 ½ cups sugar
• ⅔ cup water
• 1 tablespoon light corn syrup
• ¾ cup heavy cream
• 2 ½ teaspoons sea salt

Frosting
• ½ cup plus 1 tablespoon unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder
• ½ cup plus 1 tablespoon boiling water
• 2 ¼ cups unsalted butter, room temperature
• ¾ cup confectioners’ sugar, sifted
• ¼ teaspoon salt
• 1 ½ pounds best-quality semi-sweet chocolate, melted and cooled

To make the cupcakes:

Preheat oven to 350°F. Line mini muffin pans with paper liners.  Whisk together flour, cocoa, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Add eggs, buttermilk, oil, vanilla, and water. Using an electric mixer on low speed, mix until smooth.  Fill muffin pans about ⅔ full. Bake about 15 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool in pans on wire racks about 10 minutes. Remove cupcakes from pans and set them on wire racks to cool completely.  Cupcakes can be stored overnight at room temperature or frozen in an airtight container for up to 1 month.

To make the caramel filling
Heat sugar, water, and corn syrup in a heavy saucepan over high heat. Stir occasionally until syrup is clear. Attach a candy thermometer to side of pan. Stop stirring, and cook until syrup comes to a boil, washing down sides of pan with a wet pastry brush as needed.  Boil, gently swirling pan occasionally, until mixture is caramelized and temperature just reaches 360°F.  Remove pan from heat. Slowly pour in cream and stir with a wooden spoon until smooth. Stir in sea salt. Use immediately. If caramel begins to harden, reheat gently until pourable.  Using a paring knife, cut a cone-shaped piece, about ½-inch deep, from the center of each cupcake. Spoon 1 to 2 teaspoons of warm filling into each cupcake. Sprinkle a pinch of sea salt over filling.

To make the frosting
Combine cocoa and boiling water. Stir until cocoa has dissolved.  Using an electric mixer on medium-high speed, beat butter, confectioners’ sugar, and salt until pale and fluffy. Reduce speed to low and add melted and cooled chocolate. Beat until combined. Beat in cocoa mixture.  Frosting can be refrigerated up to 5 days or frozen up to 1 month. Bring to room temperature and beat on low speed until smooth before using.  Fit a pastry bag with a medium open-star tip (Wilton #18). Fill pastry bag with frosting. Pipe onto cupcakes, swirling tip and releasing as you pull up to form a peak. Garnish with a pinch of sea salt.

Cupcakes are best eaten the day they are filled and frosted. Store at room temperature in an air-tight container until ready to serve.

Makes about 56 to 60 mini cupcakes.

Shrimp Salad On Cucumber Slices

One of my new favorite sites to get recipes from is Skinnytaste.com.  There are lots healthy recipes that actually taste delicious!  I picked a couple to try out on the bunco girls.  This was a winner!  Super easy too!  Here is the link to the recipe:

http://www.skinnytaste.com/2010/08/shrimp-salad-on-cucumber-slices.html

Baked Mozzarella Sticks

These were made with ingredients I had on hand from the recipe at skinnytaste.com...one of my new favorite places to get recipes.  I made a couple of changes...just used store bought Italian bread crumbs and used egg whites instead of wasting a whole egg, since I always have a container of egg whites in the fridge.  The thing I didn't do was freeze the mozzarella sticks long enough.  Some of the sticks melted in spots and didn't hold their shape.  Just be sure to freeze them through and you will be happy.

I used homemade marinara, but you can use whatever your family likes.  Enjoy!

Lemon Orzo Soup

I have a habit of going to the library to get the next book in a series I am reading, and walking out with a bag of books I can hardly carry.  This includes the next 4 books in the series, just in case someone comes and wants it before I finish the one I'm on...am I the only one who does this?  Then I just renew them until I can't renew any more.  Anyone?  Okay, maybe it's just me.

What else is in the bag you ask?  Cookbooks...LOTS of cookbooks.  This past time they had a lot of NEW ones too!  In MY section!  So it is only natural for me to take all the new ones to peruse at my leisure, right?  Well, I do it.  I usually take about half back the following day after I skim the pages and know I won't cook from them, because I feel guilty for taking so many books.  I know I'm weird...no need to point it out.

So you are wondering where this is going, right?  And if it's leading to the soup?  It is.  I found this cookbook by Eva Longoria and it has a LOT of recipes that I would like to try.  One of my childhood favorites is the Lemon Rice soup.  I have always had it when dining out, and have never attempted to make it at home.  This soup is made with orzo instead of rice.  It sounded similar and an easy accompaniment to the paninis I was making for the boys for dinner.

When my  husband works late, we do easy dinners.  The boys mostly request breakfast for dinner, paninis, or homemade pizza.  We went with paninis and soup since it was a little chilly out yesterday.  I think I added to much lemon, so will be careful adding that next time, but I still loved it.  The kids decided to have extra paninis and skip the soup.  That's okay though, it was tart. 

Boys sandwiches are always with the same ingredients per their request, sun dried tomatoes and fresh mozzarella.  I add basil to mine.  YUM.

Here is the recipe:

Lemon Orzo Soup

Ingredients 

4 to 5 cups Chicken or Vegetable Broth (home made or store bought)

1 cup dried orzo pasta

Juice from 1 to 2 small lemons (2 to 4 tablespoons juice)

2 large egg yolks 

Pinch of kosher salt

In a small saucepan, bring the chicken broth to a boil. Stir in the orzo and cook until al dente, 8 to 9 minutes. The soup should be very brothy. Add more hot stock if necessary. Stir in the lemon juice.

In a small bowl, beat the egg yolks. Stir the hot broth into the egg yolks 1 tablespoon at a time, up to 6 tablespoons. This tempers the yolks and prevents them from cooking too fast and curdling. Stir the yolks into the soup. Add a pinch of salt, or to taste. Ladle the soup into 2 to 4 soup bowls and serve at once.

Strawberry Stuffed French Toast

These were so delicious!  And very easy to make!  Here is what you do:

1. Beat a few eggs and added some milk to them and set that aside.  
2. Hull your strawberries and use an egg slicer to slice them into thin pieces.  
3. Using a paring knife, cut a pocket into a thick slice of texas toast.  Add as many strawberries as you can to fill the pocket.  Be careful not to poke a hole through the bread.  
4. Dip the bread into the egg/milk mixture and cook on a griddle as you would with regular french toast.  Do these in batches and put cooked ones in a 200 degree oven to keep warm.  
5. Top with freshly sliced strawberries and maple syrup!

I served these with scrambled eggs and bacon.  Don't forget the coffee!!!!  Enjoy.

Mini Potato Pancakes with Smoked Salmon, Sour Cream & Chives

 

These are amazingly delicious and look very elegant on the table.  If someone in your house isn't a fan of smoked salmon, skip it.  I had an extra small plate ready for anyone who may not want the salmon, but everyone ate them.  That includes my 7 and 11 year old boys, so try it...don't be a wimp!

I got this recipe from Gale Gand's "Brunch!" cookbook.  Can you tell yet that I love it?  My last few posts have been from this amazing book.  Go get it!

To make these delicious bites (which can be served warm or at room temperature) you need to wash and quarter 4 large russet potatoes, and peel and quarter 1 1/2 medium yellow onions.  Put through a food processor with the grater attachment.  Then drain the liquid out.  Put 1/3 back into the food processor and puree.  Add it all together and continue to drain out the excess water.

In a separate bowl mix 2 eggs, 1 tsp salt, 1/4 tsp pepper.  Pour this over the potato mixture.  Sprinkle 1 cup of flour over the entire mixture and incorporate completely.  

Pour enough canola oil into a medium high heat pan to coat the bottom.  Form one inch potato balls and flatten them out with a spoon.  Let them cook until golden brown (about 5 minutes) and flip.  

Top these with sour cream, smoked salmon pieces and fresh chives.

Baked Eggs in Ham Cups

These are very easy to make, delicious and they look fancy!  At least that is what my 7 year old said.  Then the boys went on to say how I should be on Top Chef.  Yep, they know how to get what they want out of me...compliment my cooking!  lol.  

Gale Gland has an amazing cookbook called "Brunch!" and it is out of this world fantastic.  You will want to cook your way through this one!

To make these you line your muffin tin with ham, add an egg (or two if you use large, I had extra large so only one would fit), 2 cubes of fresh mozzarella cheese, 1/4 tsp basil pesto, sliced cherry tomato on top.  That's it!  Bake it in a 375 degree oven for 20 minutes.

Here is the online link to the recipe:  http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/recipe?id=11334888