Baking for the Freezer: Magic Wands and Mini Cupcakes

It's school week, which means I'm baking up a storm getting ready to pack some completely home-made, nutrient-rich lunchbox goodies for my girls. Yesterday, I made fairy princess bread. Today, I made magic wands and some magical cupcakes. The magic in the cupcakes is that they're full of green apples and orange carrots. They are still dessert -- I don't mistake them for anything else -- but if I'm going to serve dessert, I might as well get some green and orange in the girls' bellies, right?

Both of these goodies were taste-tested today by my girls and their friends, and both passed with high marks. The kids kept asking for more. Good thing the cupcake recipe turned out a whole bunch! I'm sticking these in the freezer. By freezing them on a cookie sheet until solid, then transferring to containers, I can preserve the shape of the cupcakes. A frozen cupcake packs wonderfully, thawing just in time for lunch at school when placed in an insulated lunchbox.

Magic Wands

What You Need:

• 1 packet of active dry yeast
• 2 tsp sugar
• 1 cup warm water
• 2 Tbsp olive oil
• 1 tsp sea salt
• 3 cups all-purpose flour (or substitute whole wheat for half)
• colorful jimmies
• almond bark or white chocolate (1/4 lb was all I needed)
• colored sugar

How it's Done:

1. Combine yeast, sugar, and water in a mixing bowl. Stir and let this sit for ten minutes until doubled in volume and bubbly.
2. Mix in oil, salt, and flour. Knead 5 to 7 minutes, until smooth and elastic.
3. Cover and let dough rest at least 15 minutes. It's forgiving: If you need to let it rest an hour or two, just punch it down when you're ready to move on.
4. Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface. Divide in half.
5. Roll each half into a roughly 9x11" rectangle. Sprinkle colorful jimmies over dough and run the rolling pin over it to press them into the dough.
6. Cut the dough into strips, less than 1" wide.
7. Twist the ends of the dough until a tight spiral shape is achieved.
8. Place each spiral straight on a parchment-lined baking sheet. Bake at 425 degrees for 14 minutes, or until golden brown and crisp. Let cool completely.
9. Melt almond bark. Dip the end of each wand into the melted candy, then sprinkle with colored sugar for a magical tip.
10. Let the candy harden. Store tightly covered.

Mini Apple-Carrot Cupcakes with Honey-Butter Frosting
makes about 56 mini cupcakes

I love honey-butter frosting. I first made it with maple cupcakes and everyone gobbled them up. This time I paired the frosting with a denser cupcake and it didn't disappoint. The batter is very thick and full of fruit and vegetables. If your eaters are fussy about this, I suggest you puree them instead of grating them.

What You Need:

for the cupcakes:

• 1/2 cup safflower or other light oil
• 1/2 cup softened butter
• 3/4 cup granulated sugar
• 4 large eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 2 tsp baking soda
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 6 carrots (peeled or not -- I peeled mine)
• 3 small apples (peeled or not -- I did not peel these, and I used Granny Smith)

for the frosting:

• 1 cup butter, softened
• 1/2 cup honey
• 5 to 6 cups confectioner's sugar

How it's Done:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line mini cupcake tin with papers or spray lightly with non-stick cooking spray.
2. Grate the carrots and apples and set them aside.
3. Beat butter, oil, and sugar until smooth. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well between additions. Add vanilla extract.
4. Slowly stir in flour, cinnamon, and baking soda. Once all are incorporated, beat on medium-high 2 minutes.
5. Fold in apples and carrots.
6. Fill cupcake tins all the way to the top. Bake 15 to 18 minutes, or until top springs back when pressed gently. Let the cupcakes cool completely before frosting.
7. For the frosting, beat together the butter and honey. Slowly add the confectioner's sugar until the desired consistency is met. If you want to color the frosting, do so before adding the confectioner's sugar. Frost as desired.

How are you preparing for back to school? Have you ever cooked ahead and frozen portions for lunchboxes?

It's Almost Back to School Time

..which means it's almost back to packing lunches. What will you send to school? If you're like me, you'll be packing lunch. And, if you're like me, you'll be wanting some variety in your daily packing. One of my favorite ways to ensure variety in my children's lunches is by cooking ahead and freezing individual portions. Little sweets freeze well, and allow you to dole them out every now and then...a sort of unexpected happy ending to a wholesome homemade lunch.

I'd like to invite you to follow my lunchbox journey this school year, which I'll chronicle at my new blog, 360 Lunch Boxes (pardon the layout changes while I find a look that suits me). Between now and the start of school, I'll be posting some how-to guidelines using some of my favorite new tools to make lunches more exciting. Once school begins, I'll be posting my kids' (and husband's, sometimes) lunchboxes with instructions when appropriate. I hope to expand my repertoire and inspire others to move beyond the square-shaped PBJ.

For us, school begins in less than two weeks. Because it's creeping up on me, I'm starting my preparations now. Today, I'm baking tiny maple cupcakes. These freeze very well. Popping a frozen cupcake into a lunchbox keeps it fresh and stable until lunchtime. Using a mini variety and all-natural ingredients makes me feel good about sending this bite-sized treat to school with my girls. I hope you enjoy it.

Mini Maple Cupcakes with Honey Butter Frosting
(cupcakes gently adapted from this recipe at Baking Bites)

What You Need:

for the Mini Maple Cupcakes:

• 1/2 cup sweet cream butter, at room temperature
• 2/3 cup sugar (try maple sugar in these!)
• 2/3 cup pure maple syrup (grade B is best)
• 2 eggs
• 1/3 cup milk (I used unsweetened vanilla almond milk)
• 1 tsp vinegar (I used apple cider vinegar)
• 2 tsp vanilla extract (you can make your own like me!)
• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp fine sea salt

for the Honey Butter Frosting:

• 1 cup sweet cream butter at room temperature
• 1/2 cup honey
• 4 tsp 5 cups confectioner's sugar

How it's Done:

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and line 36 mini muffin cups with papers. Stir together in a small bowl the milk and vinegar. Set aside. In a separate bowl, stir together the flour, baking powder, and salt, and set it to the side.
2. Beat the butter on medium speed until light, about 30 seconds. Add the sugar and beat again. When the sugar's all incorporated, slowly pour in the maple syrup with the beaters going at medium speed.
3. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Then, add the vanilla extract.
4. Pour the now curdled milk into the mixing bowl and beat again to combine.
5. Slowly add your flour mixture with beaters on medium-low speed until all the flour has been added. Turn up the mixer to medium-high and beat for two minutes.
6. Pour the batter into the prepared cupcake cups. Fill them almost completely.
7. Bake ten to twelve minutes. Let the cupcakes cool completely before frosting.

8. To make the frosting, beat the butter and honey on medium-high until creamy and smooth.
9. Slowly add the confectioner's sugar, scraping sides as needed. Beat until the desired consistency is met.

Baker's tip: Have everything ready to go before the beaters hit the batter. Now, I don't have any of those cute prep dish sets (but boy, do I want them!), so I use what's on hand. But having everything ready to go -- pans greased, ingredients measured, oven preheated -- helps keep me on task. A side benefit is never realizing halfway through a recipe that you're missing a key ingredient. Take a moment and do your prep work. It's worth the effort.

Spring (fever) is in the Air

Day 61.

I have spring fever. I want the yucky days to go away and the sun to shine and the birds to sing and the flowers to bloom.

I'll eat my words in a couple of months when I'm choking down allergy pills and sweating all day long.

But for now, I crave springtime. So I made these lovely little cupcakes:

Don't mind the blue blotch on the side. My frosting was melting in my humid kitchen. The kids didn't mind. :)

You can make these lovelies, too!

All you need is:

• a batch of your favorite cupcakes
• buttercream frosting (chocolate and vanilla)
• food coloring for roses and grass
• red licorice strings
• decorating tips and bags, and a flower nail

I found the instructions for this edible craft at Family Fun. They used coconut for the grass, but I opted to use green frosting instead. My kids don't like coconut.

Making the basket weave for the bottom of the baskets is time-consuming. You can skip this step and just add a border at the top of the cupcake base if you prefer. And if you don't want to make buttercream roses, you can buy the sugar variety in your baking aisle or craft supply store.

Happy (almost) Spring!

Flower Basket Cupcakes instructions:

1. Remove cupcake liners.
2. Create the basket by doing a basket weave design using chocolate buttercream icing.
3. Make buttercream roses (small ones), using 3 to 4 roses per cupcake.
4. Fill in the gaps with green icing grass.
5. Braid 3 strands of red licorice. Form the basket handle with the licorice braid.

If I Knew You Were Comin' I'd Have Baked a Cake

...or at least a cupcake! The sweet treat I chose to make this weekend was a batch of cupcakes. I put together a bunch of ingredients and I'm calling my creation Banana Spice Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting. Here's how it's done:

Mash three over-ripe bananas in a large mixing bowl.

Add 1 1/2 cups milk and 1 cup vegetable oil. If you have whole milk, use it. The creamier, the better. If all you have is skim, so be it. Spend some time stirring this up so it's very well combined.

One at a time, add in 3 large eggs. Beat well between additions.

Add in 2 cups of granulated sugar. Now set this bowl aside and grab another one.

In this new bowl, measure out 3 cups of cake flour. If you don't have cake flour, all-purpose flour will do, but sift it first, or at the very least, give it a good stir with a spoon before you measure it.

Into the flour, stir 2 tsp baking powder, 2 tsp ground cinnamon, 1/4 tsp ground cloves, 1/4 tsp ground nutmeg, and 1 tsp sea salt (I use sea salt for everything. Table salt will do just fine).

All at once, add the flour mixture to your wet ingredients and stir thoroughly to combine.

Line muffin tins with liners, or spray with non-stick cooking spray. Fill 3/4 full with batter.

Bake at 350 degrees for about 22 minutes, or until toothpick inserted near center comes out clean.

Let the cupcakes cool completely before frosting. It's a good time to begin your frosting. I forgot to take pictures of this part, but it's really easy. Just dump 2 8 oz boxes of softened cream cheese, along with 1/2 cup of softened butter into a mixing bowl. Beat on high until light and fluffy. Beat in 3 cups of confectioner's sugar gradually, and also add 1 tsp of vanilla extract. Use this to frost your cupcakes. Then, sprinkle them with cinnamon and sugar (1 part cinnamon to 3 parts sugar).

Enjoy!