Cupcake #3 and #4: German Chocolate and Marble Cupcakes

Cupcake #3: German Chocolate

Recipe Overview: 

Due to Valentines Day and an increase desire to have cupcakes I decided to tackle two different cupcakes. First was the German Chocolate cupcake, which is the basic chocolate cupcake (pg 37) with Coconut Pecan Fudge Frosting (pg 147). The Chocolate and Vanilla Marble Cupcakes are made with the marble cupcake recipie (pg 83) and topped with Vegan Fluffy Buttercream Frosting ( pg 142). 

Preparation: 

The Thursday before Valentines Day I decided to make the German Chocolate cupcakes for two reasons. First was that I was going to my grandmothers house the next day to visit her and other family members including my mother. The second is that the only cupcake my husband will eat is German Chocolate and considering that he is my sweetie and it's Valentines Day I would make these with him in mind. 

The goal of not making a complete and total mess of my kitchen was completely achieved with this cupcake. However, due to the fact I was so clean, I was incredibly slow baking this cupcake. I was so slow that my son actually put himself to bed without me knowing it. Anyone who knows my son is that this was HUGE because getting him into bed is normally a process and a lot of "NO" coming from him.  Despite the fact that it took me a long time to mix and bake the base cupcake, they were the best yet. They were really moist and formed perfectly. Plus they looked really cute in the Valentines cupcake liners. 

The frosting was another adventure, not because it was particularly hard but because I didn't have the proper tools. The recipe calls for a sauce pan to heat the coconut milk and sugar. I don't have one, so I used a small skillet. BIG MISTAKE. I turned my head for two seconds and the next thing you know I have bubbled over sugar stickiness on my stove. Note to self... invest in a sauce pan for the short time I'm in this apartment if I decide to do this again. After the mess was gone though, this was the easiest frosting I've made and tasted super yummy even before combined with the cupcake. 

Cupcake #4: Chocolate and Vanilla Marble 

The Chocolate and Vanilla Marble cupcake was made on Valentines day with me and my son. The reason it was chosen is because I had all the ingredients from previous cupcakes and a lot of frosting left from when I made the Strawberry Tall Cakes. 

When making this cupcake, I was neat again considering my son was involved, but much quicker with the whole process. First I made the vanilla portion. The batter was much denser than I thought it would be. Then the chocolate portion came, which basically was just adding some cocoa powder and a little water to the vanilla batter. Again, very dense. 

When it got to the part of filling the cupcake liners, I suddenly understood the need for the density. So the first step is putting in a little vanilla batter, then a little chocolate, the a little vanilla again. Next you swirl, which my son LOVED. The density is needed so you don't end up with a chocolate milk looking cupcake, but instead you get a nice swirl. This process was VERY messy for just me, especially messy for my son. 

This was the only time I haven't had frosting drama cause it was already made. I basically just used a star tipped bag and piped on the frosting I had. Throw on a couple of vegan sprinkles and bam! ... cute cupcake. 

Results:

Well, for the German Chocolate I figured my family would eat them up. After all I had brought vegan cupcakes for them before, all though they were not mine. However, only one person ate one half of a cupcake. Thank goodness my husband liked them because he helped me east some of them along with co-workers the following week. 


The marble cupcakes were all mine. Not because I wanted to keep them all to myself ... but due to public safety. My son has been battling a cold for the past week and I know he got the cupcakes all germmy. Therefore, I had to eat them all to protect the general public from contracting a horrible cold. Your welcome. They were super yummy by the way. 


Thoughts While Baking:

So as you know, I'm working on my PhD and have come to a crossroads. I've started wondering what the hell am I doing this for. I'm normally not the type to start something and then not finish, so this realization is kind of bothering me. Not to mention the guy I want to do my dissertation with seems to be too busy to keep a meeting with me. If I can't meet up with him, I think I'm just going to stop. Seems pointless to keep torturing myself with this PhD thing if it's going to be burdensome for me as well as others.  We'll see what happens.