Banana Cupcakes & Cinnamon and Oat Topped Banana Cupcakes

500 Cupcakes features several cupcakes recipes per chapter and then gives “variations” on the main cupcakes at the end to achieve the 500 number. It seemed like a waste to only make one cupcake so I made the Banana cupcake and the cinnamon and oat topped variation.

Ingredients

butter (I used Earth Balance)

super fine suger

flour

eggs

nutmeg

bananas

cream cheese

confectioners sugar

lemon juice

vanilla extract

cinnamon

sugar

oats

butter

flour

The Process

This is a pretty easy recipe, you mix everything up and throw it into cupcake tins. The frostings were also really easy. While the cream cheese frosting really needs a hand mixer the oat topping was able to be mixed by hand.

The Results

While it did look like the photo, the taste was disappointing. The cupcake was really heavy and I prefer the banana bread I usually make which is much lighter. I was also really unimpressed by the pairing with cream cheese frosting. This seemed odd and indeed it tasted odd. We took the rest of the frosting and ate it with strawberries instead for a better treat The crumb topping was a better choice, but a little oily.

 

Owl Cupcake

I admit it, I am a cake decorating fiend! There was a time when all I wanted to do was read about how fancy wedding cakes were made and decorated. I was glued to the Food Network. But who has the time or money for all the supplies needed to make those huge creations you see on Food Network Challenge? Hello Cupcake let’s me get that rush on a small scale with low tech supplies. These owls looked adorable and very simple, plus I all ready had some cupcakes on hand so I figured…why not?

 

Ingredients:

Cupcakes

Chocolate frosting

Oreos or other chocolate sandwich cookie

Fruit and Plenty Candy

Pecans

M & M’s or chocolate lentils

 

The Process:

I got a nice evenly coated spread of frosting by following some tips from the book and microwaving it for a few second before spreading. then I proceeded with the most difficult step, twisting apart an Oreo so that most of the frosting remains on one side. It took me a few tries and 1 or 2 crumbled Oreos. After that it was smooth sailing.I used a little frosting to glue the lentil to the Oreos eyes. In fact the frosting is pretty much the “spackle” holding all the pieces tog ether in this recipe. Since I had made regular sized cupcakes they were large to accommodate the two Oreo eyes. This is not a design for mini cupcakes (unless you can twist apart mini Oreos without cracking them). Slap on two pecan ears and a yellow fruit and plenty nose and you are done.

Disclaimer: The book has you pipe on a little hair or whiskers by putting frosting in a small ziplock, snipping the ned and pipping. However when I got up to this point the owl was all ready looking so cute I did not want to add anything else.

 

The Result:

See for yourself. Looks like a wide-eyed owl to me, and really low tech. This is a winner to me.