What Time Is It?

...CUPCAKE TIME!!

With the proper supplies (vintage apron, 37-song doo-wop playlist, recipes...), last night turned into Morgan-being-a-baking-diva-or-at-least-attempting-to Wednesday. This baking adventure was kind of a redo, since I basically used the same recipe as last time but fixed the things that made them weird. This go-round, they actually seemed like cupcakes! But first: pictures of swirly batter. Because it's so pretty.

And then...

MAGIC! 

They were so gorgeous that this is currently my favorite picture EVER. I completely understand if it's now yours, too.

See the red thing? That's a cupcake carrier.

Cool, right? Totally something you would want to put on your Christmas list, I'm sure.

Speaking of Christmas lists... I also asked for pastry bags and tips. (I am such a baking nerd.) But hey! See how nice that frosting looks? Yeah. I know.

If you're reading this (because the Blogger-stats SWEAR that people actually do), you just might have been one of the people I forced my cupcakes on today. If so: I really like you, because you probably said nice things about them. So expect the question "Do you want one?" again in the near future, and note: the right answer is yes. Because, after all, I like being your friend. You eat my baking adventures. You are cool. 

And you probably don't want to be the person who makes me do a modified Godfather impression.

Do you think my answer will be yes? 

Well... if you've seen the Godfather, you know it will be. BUT THEN SOMEDAY (and that day may never come), I'll call upon you to do a service for me.

And who wants a debt to the Godbaker?

xoxo

P.S. I often look for excuses to quote that scene, so if by some misfortune, you DO manage to be the person who leads me to stuff tissues in my mouth and talk with a fake Italian accent... it's really not your fault. I'm sorry. Forgive me. Have a cupcake.

Baking Adventure #3

   

Since I've been having a pumpkin obsession recently, I decided I had to make Nutella Cheesecake Pumpkin muffins. Which wasn't as random as it sounds; I found a recipe when visiting my cooking muse, and then I had to make it. It was no longer a choice.

And if you can't tell by the zillion muffin pictures, I'm very proud of them. They actually look like they turned out properly! It's a miracle! They taste really good, too... which is always a plus. 

The recipe was super easy compared to my more recent adventures, and there's even a version with commentary and pictures. Which is this version. Which is probably my favorite version, but it's not exactly easy to print out without creating a small novel. 

Hope everyone's having a good weekend!

xoxo

Baking Adventure #2

Baking Adventure #2 proved to be somewhat of a disaster... at least initially. I'll let you known now that the recipe for Elsie's Wedding Cupcakes is extremely delicious (in other words, the ones I made ended up being edible, even though at first it seemed like I was making a giant failure), and I'm sure if you try them they'll turn out perfectly. I'm just a bit baking challenged.

Everything was going fantastically in the cupcake-batter making process. I can even say after sampling some that it is the best cupcake-batter I have ever tasted, so it didn't seem that I went wrong there. The cupcakes (all 18 of them) went into the oven, and life seemed good.

..and then I took them out. The toothpick came out clean, but as soon as I started cutting the little cupcake-cones out they looked undercooked. I panicked. Back in the oven they went (a good 10 minutes after I turned it off), and it was basically downhill from there. On the upside, the frosting and filling turned out great! I ended up using apricot-raspberry preserves instead of raspberry jam, but it was still really yummy. I ate a lot of that to comfort myself while the cupcakes baked again.

Eventually I just gave up: they were not baking anymore. I was going to have to throw them all out, and I was going to have nothing for the class potluck the next day. That is, until I sampled one on my baking guinea pig... And guess what! She liked it! Turns out they were in fact really good, and I'd been freaking out for no reason. About a gazillion people told me they were fantastic the next day, and everyone lived happily ever after. 

(Which I'm hoping is going to be how I end ALL my baking adventures, but you never know...)

Baking Adventure #1

I decided (with the inspiration of  A Beautiful Mess and my new desire to do Autumn-ly things) to make a pumpkin pie today. I even woke up before ten to do so! You have no idea how much of an accomplishment that is.

Pumpkin pie a la Paula Deen made my day mostly because it meant I got to break out the vintage kitchen supplies (the apron is my favorite; it used to be my Grandmother's), but unfortunately that meant I spent a large chunk of time stopping and taking pictures of things before I actually got around to baking. But several hours later, pies were eventually made, nonetheless.

Before

...and after!

And since it was a baking adventure after all, some risks were taken. For instance, the battle with the pumpkin can was very intense, and I somehow managed to injure myself. If it scars, though, I imagine I'll have to come up with a better story than that.

Ghastly, I know.

But other than that, everything else worked out fine, due in a large part to my Aunt Carol, whose long-distance baking advice kept me from burning either of the two pies.
And they all lived happily ever-after.

Pie, anyone? ;)