Citrus Season

Winter is one of my favorite times of the year, if only because it means that citrus fruit is finally in season. I love the sourness of grapefruit and oranges, and the way that the juice drips out of them when you cut them open to see all of the perfectly-sized segments. Last week, I came home with a twenty-pound bag of grapefruit, and realized that I had to do something with it. As much as I crave it, I just couldn't eat the whole thing alone. I thought about stir fry, and about juice. But then I realized that there was no dessert in the house. And that just wouldn't do.

I didn't have a specific recipe for grapefruit cupcakes, but by taking the ingredients from a few basic recipes and tweaking them a little bit, I hit on something that I think is pretty fantastic.

These cupcakes are light and tart, with a beautiful golden color. The zest almost melts into the crumb, and the flavor really shines through in the aftertaste. The next time I make them, I might even add another tablespoon of juice. The cream cheese frosting is, of course, amazing. A little bit of salt draws the grapefruit juice out and makes it sing. After the heavy holiday foods we've all been eating, I think these are the perfect dessert.

I haven't tried these with any other fruit juice yet, but I imagine they would be just as good with orange or lime juice. Let me know if you come up with anything else!

Grapefruit Cupcakes

Zest and juice from one half of a red grapefruit, plus several intact segments
¾ cup self rising flour
¾ cup all purpose flour
½ cup butter at room temperature
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
½ cup milk

8 oz. cream cheese (softened)
1/2 cup butter (softened)
1 lb. powdered sugar
1 tbsp. grapefruit juice
1 tsp. salt

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line a muffin tin with 12 liners. Combine the flours in a bowl.

Cream the butter and sugar until smooth. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Add the flour and milk in three parts, flour-milk-flour. Mix just until blended. Add the juice and zest, and beat until just combined.

Spoon the batter into the muffin tin, filling each cup just over half full. Bake for 12-15 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

Meanwhile, beat together the butter and cream cheese until no lumps remain. Add the powdered sugar and salt. When combined, add the grapefruit juice. Beat for five minutes to ensure that the icing is smooth.

When the cupcakes have cooled, frost them and garnish with part of a grapefruit segment.

At Last

I know I've been talking about coconut cupcakes for a long time. Other things just kept getting in the way. New recipes, slightly better pictures, 22-hour bus rides to Georgia... But I'm home now, and finally ready to share these with you.

They're from Ina Garten's cookbook, which I've raved about before. I was paging through, saw this recipe, and literally couldn't get it out of my head. It followed me everywhere, until one Sunday afternoon, I just had to make it.

My cupcakes weren't quite as beautiful as Ina's--no big surprise there--but the piles of frosting and the rough texture of the coconut sprinkled on top made them look a bit rustic rather than messy. And the flavor...the coconut inside the batter kept them moist and came through beautifully. It wasn't overpowering, and it added just the right touch of something unique. And, of course, there's cream cheese frosting. Coconut cream cheese frosting, no less. What more could a girl ask for?

Coconut Cupcakes
Adapted from Ina Garten
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup sugar
3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
3 large eggs
3/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
3/4 teaspoon pure almond extract
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 7-ounce package flaked sweetened coconut, divided
Cream cheese icing

Line 16 muffin cups with paper baking cups, and set aside. Preheat oven to 325 degrees, and set oven racks at top and lower middle levels.

In a medium bowl, stir together the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Set aside. In a large mixing bowl, beat together the sugar and butter on medium speed for about 3 minutes, or until light and fluffy. Turn the mixer speed to low, and add the eggs one at a time, beating 1 minute after each. Beat in the vanilla and almond extract. Scrape down the sides of the bowl, and beat again briefly.

Add the flour mixture and the buttermilk alternately to the butter mixture, beating on low speed after each addition just until combined. Fold in only 1 1/3 cups of the coconut.

Fill each muffin cup almost full with batter. (These cupcakes will overflow, which gives them a nice big top to put frosting on.) Bake in a 325-degree oven for 11 to 14 minutes on the top and lower-middle racks of oven, then reverse the positions of the two cupcake pans (putting the one from the top on the lower middle rack and vice versa), and bake another 11 to 14 minutes or until the cupcake tops are golden and a wooden toothpick inserted in the center of a cupcake comes out clean.

Allow the cupcakes to cool completely, and then top them with cream cheese icing and a sprinkle of coconut.

Midnight Baking

Remember how I told you about midnight baking? I do a lot of that. Most of my waking hours are spent in class, and thinking about what I did in class, and writing long, complicated papers about the things we talked about in class. Not that I don't love school, but sometimes I'd rather get up in the morning and bake cinnamon roll muffins than go talk about literature.

The problem with midnight baking is that it doesn't always--okay, fine, ever--make for the best photography. My pictures come out blurry, and even though the food is wonderful, the photographic evidence is only so-so. What I'm saying here is that you'll need to trust me on these things.

Last weekend, after I came home early to work on a paper that I did not want to write, I got hungry. Really, really hungry. And at 11:30 on a Friday night, when I was feeling sorry for myself, I didn't want pasta or a sandwich. I wanted baked goods. Preferably with cream cheese frosting.

A quick recipe search later turned up exactly what I was looking for: gingerbread cupcakes. So what if it's not Christmas? These cupcakes, eaten at one in the morning, were just what I needed. Spicy and warm, with melting frosting. And you know how I feel about cream cheese frosting.

It's starting to get cold now, with the wind sneaking in under our collars and the leaves turning to gold and orange. You need to fortify yourself for the long winter ahead, and the way to do that is with cupcakes. Trust me.

Gingerbread Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting
Adapted from Gourmet

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons ground ginger
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon allspice
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 stick (1/4 cup) plus 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/2 cup granulated sugar
Just shy 1/2 cup unsulfured molasses
2 tablespoons vanilla yogurt
1 large egg, beaten lightly
1 teaspoon baking soda

1 (8-ounce) package cream cheese softened
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter softened
1 pound box confectioners' sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon kosher salt

Into a bowl sift together the flour, the ground ginger, the cinnamon, the cloves, the allspice, and the salt. In another bowl cream 1/2 stick of the butter, add the granulated sugar, and beat the mixture until it is fluffy. Beat in the molasses, the yogurt and the egg, beating until the mixture is smooth. In a measuring cup combine the baking soda with 1/2 cup boiling water and stir the mixture to dissolve the baking soda. Stir the mixture into the molasses mixture (the mixture will appear curdled) and stir the molasses mixture into the flour mixture, stirring to combine the ingredients well. Line twelve 1/2-cup muffin tins with paper liners and spoon the batter into the liners, filling them halfway. Bake the cupcakes in the middle of a preheated 350°F. oven for 20 minutes, or until a tester comes out clean. (The cupcakes will be flat or slightly indented on top.) Transfer the cupcakes to a rack and let them cool.

In a large bowl, combine the cream cheese and butter. Beat in confectioners' sugar until fluffy. Beat in vanilla and salt. Use liberal amounts to frost cupcakes.

The Holy Trinity: Salt, Cream Cheese, and Butter. Okay, and Brown Sugar.

There are no two ways around it--my mother taught me to bake. I never realized until recently how ingrained the things that she taught me were; then I started saying things like, "You mean you don't have a springform pan?" and, "What do you mean, what's a waterbath?" My house was the one growing up where everyone wanted to eat, and my lunches were always envied because my cookies didn't have a nautically-themed, store-bought name. I was spoiled, in fact. There are many things that I just can't eat now because I had them too often when I was young. Yes, I know, poor me, having eaten so many brownies and peanut-butter bars that I can't face them any longer. My life has been so hard.

But these cinnamon rolls...I don't think I'll ever be on such bad terms with them. I think I could eat them every day, every meal, until I weigh so much that they have to lift me out of the house with a crane. And that would be fine, just as long as I could bring the pan with me.

To begin with, they have cream cheese frosting. Nothing bad ever came from a recipe with cream cheese frosting. And under the frosting, they're dripping with caramelized brown sugar. It clings to every swirl of the dough, and coats the bottom of the pan so that you can't take a single bite without the very real threat of rotting out every tooth in your head. Like I said, though, it would be worth it.

And, as it always is with baking, the devil's in the details. I will do my best to tell you every little trick that my mother taught me so that these turn out. Because if they do, I guarantee you, you'll never look back. They're so good that my dog wanted to help me bake this last batch, and ended up with a nose full of flour to show for it. They will convert you to the faith of gooey, dripping frosting and brown sugar. As I have said, so it shall be.

Perfect Cinnamon Rolls
Adapted from Alton Brown

Dough:
4 large egg yolks, room temp
1 large whole egg, room temp
2 ounces sugar, approx. 1/4 cup
3 ounces unsalted melted butter, approx. 6 tbs
6 ounces buttermilk, room temperature (If you don't have buttermilk, you can use 1 cup of milk to 2 1/2 tbs of lime juice)
20 ounces all-purpose flour, approx. 6 cups, and extra for dusting
1 package instant dry yeast, approx. 2 1/4 tsp
1 1/4 tsp kosher salt
Vegetable oil or cooking spray

Filling:
16 ounces light brown sugar, approx. 2 cup packed
2 tbs cinnamon
Pinch of salt
A large chunk of softened butter, approx. 3 tbs

Icing:
4 ounces cream cheese, approx. 1/3 cup
3 ounces unsalted butter, approx. 6 tbs
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp vanilla extract
6 ounces powdered sugar

For the dough: Whisk together the egg yolks, whole egg, sugar, butter, and buttermilk. Add approximately 2 cups of the flour, the yeast and the salt; whisk until moistened and combined. In an electric mixer, use a dough hook to mix together the egg, sugar and buttermilk mixture and all but 3/4 cup of the remaining flour and knead on low speed for 5 minutes. The dough should feel soft and moist but not sticky; add more flour if necessary. Knead on low for an additional 5 minutes or until the dough clears the sides of the bowl. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead by hand for an additional 30 seconds. Lightly oil the sides of a large bowl and transfer the dough into it. Lightly oil the top of the dough, cover and let it double in volume, 2 to 2 1/2 hours.

Combine the brown sugar, cinnamon and salt in a medium bowl. Mix until well incorporated. Set aside.

Butter a 9x13 inch glass baking dish. Line the bottom of the dish with parchment paper, and then butter the top of the paper. Punch down the risen dough and turn it out onto a lightly floured work surface. Shape the dough into a rectangle with the long side nearest you by hand. Using the rolling pin, roll the dough into an 18x12 inch rectangle. Using your hands, (or a knife if you must,) spread the butter evenly on the dough, leaving a 3/4 inch border along the top edge. Do the same with half of the filling. Beginning with the edge nearest you, tightly roll the dough into a cylinder. Pinch the unbuttered seam closed to seal the roll. Gently squeeze the cylinder to create an even thickness. Cut the rolls using a serrated knife into 1 1/2-inch rolls, creating 12 rolls.

Spread the other half of the filling in the pan with the parchment paper. Evenly space the rolls in the baking dish, cover tightly with plastic wrap, and allow the rolls to rise in the fridge overnight.

The next morning...

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Place the rolls on the center rack and bake until golden brown, about 25 minutes. Remove the rolls from the oven and invert the pan onto a large serving platter so that all the melted sugar on the bottom spreads over the top. While the rolls cool slightly, whisk the cream cheese in an electric mixer until creamy. Add the butter and vanilla and whisk until combined, then add the salt and powdered sugar a bit at a time. Whisk until smooth. Spread over the rolls and serve immediately.

Baking tips from my mother, to me, to you:
*Oiling the bowl helps the bread to rise better, because it isn't clinging to the sides.
*Parchment paper, parchment paper, parchment paper. If you're planning to turn something out of a pan, (not just these rolls, but cakes or anything else,) parchment paper is going to make your life much easier. Just be sure to butter the pan and the paper.
*A little salt in the cream cheese frosting helps to cut the sweetness of the sugar. People underestimate the importance of salt in dessert. Even though it looks like a small amount, don't skip the salt.