Cupcakes Over PDFs

This time of year, going to the Central Valley is probably a bad decision. However, when you're having a family gathering, I guess it's okay. 

Instead of doing any of the work that I planned on doing while I was there, I made cupcakes instead. Cookies and cream cupcakes, mind you.

For the first time, instead of a teaching post, I want to share this recipe with you! It makes some nice vanilla cupcakes with a fairly light cream cheese frosting...but here's the kicker: add Oreos. 

You will need:

Cake

1 3/4 cup cake flour

1 1/4 cup all purpose flour

1 3/4 cup sugar

2 1/2 tsp baking flour

1 tsp kosher salt

1 cup butter (cubed and at room temp)

4 eggs

1 cup milk

2 tsp vanilla

1/2 cup Oreo crumbles

24 Oreos

(Recipe adapted from http://tinyurl.com/pn39cua)

Frosting

3/4 butter (cubed and at room temp)

4 oz light cream cheese

1 tsp vanilla extract

3 1/2 cup powdered sugar

1 tbsp milk

Extra Oreo crumbles

Ok, so I've been playing with cookies and cream cupcakes all summer. While I've been fairly happy with the result, I've been looking for a cake recipe that yielded a sturdier cake. This wins. 

*Note, food processors work really well for crumbling the cookies. I forgot I had one at first and made some really crazy looking models the first time.

**Note #2: I always use a bit more vanilla than called for...who doesn't like vanilla?

Start by lining your cupcake tins with liners while your oven preheats to 350. 

Add a whole Oreo to the bottom of each liner. This makes each one have a cereal box prize in it! 

This was my favorite part of the recipe...dump the first five ingredients into a bowl and combine them with a fork. Easy peasy. 

(I used a stand mixer here, but arm mixing is just as effective.)

Drop in small-ish portions of the cubed butter and stir to combine each portion.

Mix in the eggs one at a time. 

Pour vanilla into the milk and pour the solution into the rest of the batter in small splashes (a whole lot of sloshing happened when I got a little excited mixing.)

Once everything is combined, fold in your cookie crumbs. Your batter should look like this:

To fill my tins, I love my old, beat up, hand-me-down ice cream scoop. Fill each tin (on top of the pre-loaded Oreo) about 2/3 full. I probably could have gone more, but was worried about massive conjoined cupcakes. 

Remember how you pre-heated? Load these guys in the oven for like 15-20. Don't be surprised if it takes longer...at 18 minutes, there was not yet any golden brown happening. 

While they baked, I made the frosting, which consisted of washing the mixing bowl, dumping all of the frosting ingredients in, and turning the mixer on. If the frosting is too thick, add more milk. I've adapted this recipe a few times, and this combination has so far turned out the best. 

At this point, you should have cooling cupcakes and completed frosting. All that's left is to frost and then sprinkle some extra cookie crumbs on top. 

Cupcake success!

I'll get back to real teacher blogging soon...but for now, I have cupcakes to eat!