Fortuitously, the theme for this month's Is My Blog Burning Event was cupcakes. And cupcakes were definitely on my agenda. The recent Birthday around here not only involved baking a cake but also various other goodies to be shared with little friends who were not at the actual party.

By Monday we were all a bit sugared-out and not much in the mood for buttery frosting or anything too complicated and involved. After some UN-style negotiations we settled on Marble Cupcakes.

These were my first Marble Cakes in cups. I used my basic White Cake batter, jazzed up with some orange zest and juice. For a more grown-up version, I would add to the batter some finely chopped candied orange peel and decoratively sprinkle some over the finished cupcakes.

They were very tasty and looked pretty cute, in an understated sort of way. We decided not to do any fancy frosting or glaze and instead let confectioner's sugar snow on them. Perfect! (The only negative feedback I received was that there weren't enough cupcakes for all of the teachers ...)

Recipe

2 sticks butter, softened
1 cup sugar
5 large eggs (or 1 cup if using smaller eggs)
zest and strained juice of 1 organic orange
4 cups flour
pinch of salt
5 tsp. baking powder
1/2 to 1 cup milk
6 Tbsp. cocoa

Yield: ca. 18 medium cupcakes.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line muffin pans with liners.

Measure flour, salt, and baking powder into a bowl and stir with wire whisk.
Measure cocoa into a small bowl, add half the orange zest and stir with wire whisk.

In a large bowl cream butter with an electric mixer on high speed, add sugar and half the orange zest, mix until white and fluffy. Add eggs, one by one, until fully incorporated.

With mixer on medium to slow speed, add some of the flour mixture, half the orange juice and some milk, alternating between flour and milk until all the flour is incorporated. Add enough milk to end up with a batter that will drop from a tilted spoon by itself.

Set two thirds of the batter aside. With mixer on medium to slow speed, add cocoa with orange zest, the remaining orange juice and enough milk to achieve the required consistency.

Spoon white batter into muffin pans, a little more than half full. Spoon the dark batter over the filled pans. Carefully hold muffin liner with one hand and, using the narrow handle of a teaspoon or something similar, draw a circle through each cupcake, ending in an upward motion and bringing some of the white batter up to the top. If the surface is very uneven, you may smooth it out a bit.

Bake for ca. 20 minutes. At the end of the baking process watch like a hawk. Take the cupcakes out as soon as a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Let cool, take out of pans and dust with confectioner's sugar when completely cooled off. Enjoy!

  2:42:36 PM    
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