What a busy + fun day in the kitchen!!!
And um, studying didn’t happen 🙁 I might be a little screwed for Monday’s test.
But the baking needed to happen!
Prologue
First I had to pick a recipe. I wanted to do something pumpkiny for Halloween (DUH!) and after searching through about 100 pumpkin cupcake recipes, I decided on a batch of Vegan Pumpkin Muffins. I decided that cupcakes are just a means to serve icing so let’s go all out on the icing and save a little on the cake part. Plus, vegan ingredients are cheaper and easier! I only had 4 sticks of butter people and I needed 2.5 for the frosting!
They turned into MINI cupcakes…and then will have an appropriate name when they are iced tomorrow.
MY OTHER RECIPES
I bought all new baking leaveners today. We’ve had ours for …years….and the last time I baked I think the leaveners kind of ruined the cakes.
The old:
Expired a year ago!
I used my grandmother’s antique sifter. It’s always a blast.
They turned out perfect!
Next it was time to tackle Amelia’s Buttercream, which I had on my iPhone:
Here’s the recipe I jotted down on our walk:
Swiss Meringue Vanilla Buttercream
10 oz white suger
10 oz butter (2.5 sticks. Half cold, half room temp)
4.5 oz egg white
3 tbsp corn syrup
Vanilla extract – 2 tsp
Create a double boiler with your bowl.
Add everything but butter to mixer and whip occasionally.
Bowl over boiler, heat to 120 degrees.
Whisk every now and then. Look for thinness.
At 120 remove from bath and put under mixer on low up to high and whip to stiff peaks to a meringue of stiff peaks.
Add cold butter in chunks. Then add room temp. Keep mixer on low. Up to medium-high at end. Will get soupy. Will curdle. Then will magically turn into buttercream. Once it turns to buttercram whip on low for 5 mins.
BEGIN:
Double boiler
With whisk and thermometer
To 120* (took about 5 mins?)
Then whip until stiff peaks form
As stiff as they’re gonna get! (This blob was solid – not dripping off) (Took 10 mins?) (Finger licking was kept to a bare minimum – go me!)
Add cold butter, then room temp butter in chunks
Cross fingers:
The crossing of the fingers didn’t go exactly as planned. It did get soupy. I don’t think it ever curdled. I whipped it on high for about 20 minutes waiting for something magical to happen and it never did. It was still a little too runny to pipe onto the cakes. So I called Amelia, who told me to refrigerate it for 30 minutes. And then I got caught up in the movie. I did check it and it’s much harder now so tomorrow I will thaw a bit, whip a bit and then ice.
To be continued…..
Around 6PM Karen arrived to join us for dinner. My brew-lovin’ husband cracked open a Chocolate Porter. I swore I wasn’t going to drink tonight in preparation for the big 5K runway race tomorrow, but he poured me a taste anyways. It was awesome!
For dinner we made
Garlic + White Wine + Clam + Asparagus Pasta!
Don’t clam up about using clams!!! Other times I’ve used clams: The Surprise Ingredient, The Last Hurrah and Productive Night. They are so inexpensive and make a dish feel like a restaurant.
First we sautéed asparagus in some canola oil
Then added 4 cloves of garlic, then the clams…
Then about 1/4 cup white wine – from a BOX. A Black Box to be exact.
And finally half a lemon, red pepper flakes, a pinch of salt, a lot of black pepper and…
a smidge of butter for richness
All served over Whole Wheat Gnocchi pasta from EarthFare
The perfect pairing was too much to miss out on, so I had a splash of wine with dinner
But the deal I made was to hydrate like crazy after dinner, which is just what I’ve been doing!
MY NEW MONITOR IS SOOOOOOOO FREAKIN’ AWESOME!!!!!!!! It’s 21.5 in. wide and I can see Windows Live Writer and Windows Live Photo Gallery side by side. Blogging bliss. [And look at that Eye-Fi go! It’s been working perfectly since I got the new card)
Now I just need that blazin’ Windows 7 system to arrive!
We’re getting up at the crack of dawn in the middle of the night to get to our race on time. I get nervous whenever I think about it!
Dinner looks like it was scrumptious!
Have a great race tomorrow- go kath go!!
I’m sure those cupcakes are going to come out ridiculously amazing
Your new computer looks awesome. I’m downloading Windows Live Writer now. I’m tired of always using the WordPress page… it sucks!
Good luck at your 5K tomorrow. You’re gonna FLY!! 🙂
mmmm Can’t wait to see the finished cupcake products! I’m sure they will be amazing!
Good luck with your race and getting up early 🙂 I’m sure you will rock it.
Busy…baking…needed to happen… Sounds like the night before every race I’ve ever run…enjoy!!
I look putting clams in pasta too. Do you ever keep the leftover clams and use them later? They always look so nasty when I do that.
I like the idea of vegan cupcakes. I’m off to check the recipe for my own pumpkin goodies.
Hope the butter cream turns out.
Good eats and fabulous monitor 🙂
Good luck at the race tomorrow!
Very cute turtleneck! Yep, baking often pre-empts studying. I agree about the cupcakes being all about the frosting so you might as well save on the cake part. Looking forward to seeing the final result.
I love baking! So much fun!!
Your new computer looks awesome!!
Good luck in the race tomorrow!
Pasta looks awesome! I made clam chowder yesterday, LOVE clams! All shellfish, really. 🙂
Good luck with the race!
Jenn
Kath….I use expired baking products like that all the time. 🙂 So did my grandmother. We’re still kickin’!
I love your sweater! I also love this post and the title of it. I think if I spent that much time in the kitchen, I’d explode.
I mentioned in my post this morning that I should write a song about oatmeal and it made me think of you!
Good luck at your race!!
Kath, just picture yourself as a PLANE during your run tomorrow and TAKE OFF! Corny, but it will work I’m sure! lol. Goodluck.
The baking looks like it was a huge success too. You can’t go wrong with pumpkin anything.
Dinner looks great – I’ve never used canned clams before – I’ll have to try it. Unfortunately neither my boyfriend nor I are white wine drinkers. I always want it to cook with but then I don’t want to open a whole bottle (or box) because it always goes bad. I’ll have to make it for a party or something.
Good luck tomorrow! 🙂
Have a great race tomorrow! Is everyone running in costume, since it’s Halloween?
What fun kitchen adventures! Can’t wait to see the final result.
Such a great Friday night dinner. Simple, yet so tasty!
man lady! you’ve had some great eats today! best of luck on the 5k tomorrow!
Yay for getting new baking powder! Did you know that old baking powder sucks the thiamin out of baked goods (haha, remember that for the RD exam)!
Yum, I’ve always thought that asparagus makes the perfect accompaniment to pasta.
PS Went to a Great Harvest location for the first time today (with a fellow food blogger) and thought of you and Matt!
I made vegan pumpkin cupcakes this afternoon with vegan cream cheese icing! We are so smart…and beautiful…
i love that sifter! reminds me of home ec class back when they had home ec in schools….
That monitor must be awesome!
Those mini cupcakes look awesome. 🙂
Good luck on your run!
Good luck with your race tomorrow!
Good luck at the race!
Can’t wait to see how the cupcakes turn out!
Good luck at the race!!
Great dinner idea using clams! They sure do make dishes more elegant and fancy 🙂 Good luck at the race! You will rock it
Clams are one of the few canned seafoods I have yet to adventure in. I trust you if you say it’s not scary! 🙂 Also, the idea of chocolate beer just blew my mind a little 😛
Goood luuuck todaaaay!!!!
those cupcakes look adorable in mini size. and your dinner looks like something you’d buy at a restaurant.
good luck on your race!
Can’t not to wait to try those pumpkins!!!!
If I were you I think I’d dive head first into that icing. Ok, I guess I wouldn’t but the thought would cross my mind a few dozen times!! 🙂
My grandma has an old-timey sifter too! Her sifter is the kind that has the crank on the side to sift, but when she taught me how to make her homemade biscuits she gave me a different type that you sift by pumping the handle. Which one is yours?
dinner looks very good. i hope you had a good race!
Good luck at the race 🙂
great cupcakes and dinner looks delish!
good luck on the race tomorrow 🙂
jenna
josh uses two, large vertical side-by-side monitors. he swears by this as a productivity tool! i should try blogging from his desktop rather than this slow, gasping mac laptop. someday 🙂
hmmmm…. vegan pumpkin muffins! sounds tasty
Dont worry – your frosting will come together! It just needed some cooling down, I bet.
I’m a big fan of canned clams – good, cheap way to add protein to a pasta dish like that. I just wish my hub would get on board with it… unfortunately, he refuses to eat any canned fish / seafood!
That pasta looks sensational! Asparagus is such a wonderful veggie with pastas, it never fails to give some oomph.
Hopefully your icing will pull through, but those muffins look delicious enough by themselves!
Good luck with your race! Those muffins look delcious! I have some pumpkin in my fridge, and t his may be how it gets used! YUM
The cupcakes look soooo good! Vegan goods are always surprisingly delicious. And it’s a good idea to “save” on the cake part and indulge on the frosting 🙂
Jessica,
Not worried about safety – the leaveners stop working after a while and your baked goods will be flat!
KatieMoo,
I didn’t know that!!
BroccoliHut,
Woo hoo! What’d you get?!
Kelly,
Mine has a handle that you crank on the right side.
Kath
Good luck on the cupcakes AND the race!!
Congratulations on the race. I would love to be able to run like that.. I’m a little confused about the VEGAN pumpkin muffins you made(they look yummy) Were you going to frost them with frosting made from real butter and egg whites? I thought this was a vegan blog because I found you through the ‘Best Vegan Blogs Directory’, but I see animal products in you stuff. I think it’s a very nice blog but maybe it shouldn’t be hooked up through that directory. I don’t know, maybe I’m way off on this. I don’t mean to be a downer, because like I said, the blog is great. And it would be really easy to veganize the frosting. Anyway, I think you’re setting a good example of being healthy with all your exercise and keeping your body moving. I REALLY need to do more of that.:)
debbie,
I am definitely not a vegan. I am not sure which directory I’m listed in, but it’s a mistake! I didn’t put myself there 🙂
Kath
Thank you for replying so quickly. The blog I found you in is http://www.veganblogs.com. Maybe one of your followers listed it. Take care.
That is my kind of pasta – seafood, especially clams, are always delicious in a pasta dish, and I love that it’s a light, non -tomato, non-cream sauce. Yum 😀