Recipe #20:Burnt-Butter Brown-Sugar Cupcakes

Hello!

It's been... Well, it's been so long I don't even know where to start.

With a new house, a new job, a new country, a new life... I am very sad to say that baking, blogging and crafting have been some of the lasts things on my mind. In saying that I have managed to do a bit of thrifting in my spare time - although this is admittedly something that takes very little effort other than finding good op-shops! (Some sweet pics may just follow in another post!)

Well after 7 months of flatting we are finally in our own little whare - although not as tiny as our Cosy Cottage in the Country (oh yes, I'm breaking out the alliteration) - it is still pretty dang awesome having our own space again. And my kitchen (that's right, my kitchen) here is HUGE! It's a bit shabby, and a bit wonky... heck we don't want to pay much rent... but it has an oven and a stove and that's all that matters right? And what better way to get back into my domestic groove than to break out the dusty but trusty "How to be a Domestic Goddess" handbook.

So here it is, Recipe #20: Burnt-Butter Brown-Sugar Cupcakes (more alliteration, booyah)... only 8 months after the last recipe! Honestly the name didn't inspire much enthusiasm on my part, which could be part of the reason it took so long to get around to it. Burnt-butter? Yeaaaaaahhhhh, I wasn't so sure about that. But I am glad I finally got around to it, as this recipe was actually pretty fun! If a little time consuming in the sense that there was a lot of waiting. I had to clarify ('burn') the butter, which I've never done before. Once the butter was a nice caramel colour I had to strain it into a cup and let it set slighty so I could cream it with the sugar.

Result: delicious smelling, beautifully clear butter that smelt like toffee.

When the butter was solid enough to cream with the sugar - which took a little bit of help from the handy old fridge - I had to mix it by hand (Nigella's recipe suggests a food processor, but alas I'm sadly lacking one of those in my kitchen). Thankfully with butter that's really soft it didn't take too long and I got a bit of a work out at the same time. I used raw sugar for this recipe too instead of white sugar, and the burnt butter combined with raw sugar alone smelt like russian fudge. Seriously, there were some good smells coming out of the kitchen during this recipe...!

Prize for most delicious batter: goes to Recipe #20!

This batter was so fluffy it almost had the consistency of a perfect chocolate mousse, I couldn't believe it for a wet cupcake mixture. I probably ate at least one whole cupcake before even getting to the cooking stage. I used a mini-cupcake pan for this recipe too, instead of a regular sized one. Cupcakes are so much more appealing to me in mini-size - not just because they are cuter, but they are so much less daunting than regular (or, god-forbid TEXAS muffins!). I have "supermarket muffin phobia", meaning that I'm a bit scared to eat muffins from supermarkets and cafes because they are so HUGE and if they're dry or don't taste that nice there is still soooooo much more to get through... I had a spinach and feta muffin from a coffee shop recently and I was all prepared for it to be steamy and delicious and moist. But nooooo! It was dry! And chalky! DOOOOM! So yes, baby muffins get the big thumbs-up from me. Funnily enough I don't feel the same about really big slices of cake. In fact, I welcome them...

Anyway. They only took about 8 minutes to cook as they were so small, and they were all ready and cooling down on the bench before I even had a chance to clarify, strain and chill my next lot of butter. Nope, didn't read the recipe all the way down did I. It didn't take too long in the end (or did my impatience win out?), and it was beautiful and light - it almost had a gingery taste that reminded me a bit of ginger crunch. I found some lavender flowers in the kitchen too (one of my favourites so I seldom walk past a lavender bush without picking a few flowers and putting them in my pocket), so I decided a wee bit of decoration was definitely in order.

These cupcakes really didn't last very long at all, especially when teamed with a cup of Earl Grey and a good book...

Even my books are getting in on the alliteration game!

Chris' verdict: 4/5

Something for next time: The lovely fragrant lavender flowers were the perfect complement to the light nutty flavour of the icing, so next time I would like to try soaking some lavender in milk before mixing it in.

Ps. It's good be be back x