 |
| Green Tea Cupcakes for a good pal |
On the day of the party friends and family came round for a quick meal of wholemeal spaghetti and bean balls in marinara sauce or Potato & Leek Soup with Irish Soda bread...Picture a production line of people (just over 20) filling various plates with food and 'copping a squat' in any spare spot they could find to eat their meal before we left for the venue.
Most of the guests had turned up early and helped finished topping, pasting, decorating and generally helping anywhere they could. There were a lot of cakes to finish lol. D saw that the Green Tea Cupcakes needed decorating and offered me the help to ice them. At which point I think I had a minor meltdown and explained that I still needed to make pink little flowers to go on each one after the icing had been done. She calmly took the tools needed, icing and colouring and got stuck in. The next time I saw her, she had my step cousin Jake sat at a table and they were patiently hand cutting tiny little flowers and decorating each cupcake. They were deep in conversation having only met for the first time that afternoon...I watched from the doorway and felt able to leave the cupcakes in their very obviously capable hands. There was a huge bag of reject cupcakes from these batches and D & B took them off our hands lol. They may not have looked good but apparently they tasted just fine! lol
So it wasn't really a shock when D asked for some of these cupcakes this year..lol. And I may be used to the failing oven's quirks now because the three batches I baked off for her celebration came out just fine. I even tried one and enjoyed it very much, after claiming last year to hate the demon cupcakes....two days of baking solid with my pal and not enough sleep were probably the cause of this statement. But I was able to appreciate them this time round. I have to confess I didn't hand cut the flowers...I cheated and bought a little flower cutter. lol
 |
| Green Tea Cupcake Production Line lol |
(Recipe from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World/Moskowitz/Romero)
1/2 cup soya yoghurt
2/3 cup of rice milk
1/4 tsp vanilla extract
1/3 cup canola oil (I used sunflower)
1/2 tsp almond extract
1 1/4 cup all purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
3 tsp matcha tea powder
1/4 tsp salt
3/4 cup sugar
Green Tea Glaze:
2 tbsp vegan margarine
1 cup icing sugar
1/4 tsp matcha tea powder
2 tbsp rice milk
1/4 tsp almond extract
Drop of vanilla extract
1/4 cup of vegan fondant icing
Tiniest drop of pink food colouring ~ TINIEST!
1 tsp of vegan fondant icing for the flower centres
Preheat the oven to 350'F/180'C/Gas Mark 4 and line a muffin pan with cupcake liners.
In a large bowl add the yoghurt, rice milk, vanilla, oil, and almond extract, beating well to blend in yoghurt. Sift in the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, matcha tea powder and salt. Stir to combine the wet with the dry and to break down the big lumps.
Fill the cupcake liners to 2/3 full and place in the oven and bake for 20-23 minutes. (Mine took 23 minutes per batch ~R~) When baked remove from the oven and leave to cool completely before attempting to top them.
For the icing...With a hand held electric mixer beat the margarine to fluff and mix in the icing sugar and matcha tea to form a crumbly texture. Slowly beat in 2 tbsp rice milk, almond and vanilla extract. If the icing sugar is to spread add additional rice milk a tsp at a time.
For the flowers..in a bowl place the fondant icing and drip the colouring onto it and then knead the icing until the colour has spread throughout the icing in a uniform colour. Then roll it out between two sheets of greaseproof paper until a 1/4 " thick. Then cut out 12 flower shapes either by hand or by flower cutter. Using a toothpick gently press down onto each petal. Then prick the centre of each flower. Using the tsp of white icing divide it into 12 pieces and roll them into little balls and press into the centre of each flower.
To assemble...frost the top of each cupcake with the Green Tea Glaze and then place a flower off to one side. Press it down gently to make sure it's attached and repeat with all the remaining cupcakes. Voila! Green Tea Cupcakes...
Enjoy!
~R~
~~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
I wasn't the only one baking cupcakes for D this year. Her lovely, B, made the most gorgeous giant cupcake cake ~ Chocolate with Vanilla Frosting. Doesn't it look good? I'm told the sheep in the photo is called Bertha. lol. I have a giant cupcake mould and I have never been able to get a decent result from it so major kudos to B for making this fabulous cake.
 |
| B's wonderful Vegan Chocolate with Vanilla Buttercream Giant Cupcake |
And it would be remiss of me to not say "Happy Birthday D..." Xxx
Update: Happy to report that cupcakes were enjoyed immensely by all pals who attended the gathering. All had at least 2 each if not more and some took more home. lol. And we were treated to a wonderful Lebanese Banquet for dinner...so falafels, spinach parcels, spiced potatoes, wonderful salads, breads and fruits were enjoyed by all. It was a very lovely way to spend a Sunday afternoon and evening. So thanks to D & B for inviting us along... :o) ~R~
Additional Update: My Love just commented that I didn't mention the incident of my nearly choking to death on a falafel as I watched D, B, My Love and St ballet dancing to Winner Takes It All by Abba on the new ABBA
Wii Game. I felt it would be wrong to mention the fact that I was crying with laughter at watching them throughout this song...I even got the Muttely giggles and I'm lucky my eye make up was waterproof or I would of ended the evening looking like Alice Cooper! But I wouldn't be so mean as to mention any of this ;o) lol Hope you all had a good weekend?
~R~
