Brownies and Cupcakes for my son's first birthday!

Vanilla rainbow and chocolate cupcakes with Wilton buttercream icing

It was my youngest' first birthday last weekend. I thought I should add deserts to what the caterer provided so I decided to make some brownies and cupcakes - two of easiest deserts to bake in batches.

Of course, there has to be a project plan.

Task 1 - Make 2 batches of brownies and bake.
Task 2 - While the first 2 batches are baking, make chocolate cupcake batter.
Task 3 - Bake 2 dozens chocolate cupcakes.
Rest and let everything cool.
Task 4 - Make another 2 batches of brownies and bake.
Task 5 - While second batch of brownies are baking, make vanilla rainbow cupcake batter.
Task 5 - Bake 2 dozens vanilla rainbow cupcake batter.
Task 6 - Bake last dozen of vanilla rainbow cupcake batter.

This plan successfully yielded:

• 4 9"X13" pans of brownies, equally divided into 8 on the long side and by 4 on the short side (32 rectangles)
• 2 dozens chocolate cupcakes
• 3 dozens vanilla rainbow cupcakes

Success!!!

Recipes:

Brownies - Grandma Barb's Brownies from A Farm Girl Dabbles

• 2 c. sugar
• 1 c. vegetable oil
• 4 large eggs
• 1-1/2 c. flour
• 10 T. unsweetened baking cocoa
• 1 tsp. salt
• 2 tsp. vanilla
• semi-sweet chocolate chips, optional, to sprinkle on top
• chopped nuts, optional, to sprinkle on top

1. Preheat oven to 350°. Spray a 9" x 13" pan with cooking spray and set aside.
2. In a large mixing bowl, stir together the sugar, oil, and eggs. In a separate medium bowl, whisk together the flour, cocoa, and salt. Add the dry ingredients to the wet and mix until incorporated. Stir in the vanilla. Pour into your prepared pan and spread evenly. Sprinkle with optional chocolate chips and/or nuts. Bake for 20 minutes. Then turn the heat off, leaving the pan in the oven for another 15 minutes. Remove pan to a rack to cool completely.

Note: Best brownie recipe ever!!! No melting chocolates, no melting butter - very simple and easy to make! Also, recipe calls for 9X13 pan so you make more brownies out of each recipe!

Perfectly Chocolate Cupcakes - Recipe posted here

Vanilla Cupcakes - Recipe posted here

• To create the rainbow effect, I divided the batter into 4. I then tinted them red, green and blue separately. The last one I left untinted (to retain the yellow color). Once done, I placed 1/2 tbsp of each colored batter in the cupcake liners.

Red 1

Green 2
Blue 3...Sorry, no pic for Yellow 4 and there's no Pink 5. If you get the joke, you're too old! LOL

The rainbow connection :-)

I used Wilton's buttercream icing on both cupcakes.

Wilton's Buttercream Icing

• 1/2 cup solid vegetable shortening
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) butter or margarine softened
• 1 teaspoon clear vanilla extract
• 4 cups sifted confectioners' sugar (approximately 1 lb.)
• 2 tablespoons milk

1. In large bowl, cream shortening and butter with electric mixer. Add vanilla. Gradually add sugar, one cup at a time, beating well on medium speed. Scrape sides and bottom of bowl often. When all sugar has been mixed in, icing will appear dry. Add milk and beat at medium speed until light and fluffy. Keep bowl covered with a damp cloth until ready to use.

For best results, keep icing bowl in refrigerator when not in use. Refrigerated in an airtight container, this icing can be stored 2 weeks. Rewhip before using.

I packaged the cupcakes in a special box with cupcake holes. These are just P26 at Baker's Hub! Definitely a good buy - I didn't have any problem transporting them to the party venue.

Lesson learned: Plan ahead! I filed for vacation before my son's birthday because I knew that aside from cooking these goodies, I still have to iron out a lot of other things for the birthday. End result - Not haggard at all! :-)

PS - Thought I'd share with you our welcome banner at the party! Our cowboy theme party was a success!!!

Go Local! Make Tablea Brownies

Do you get local pasalubong every time a friend or a relative comes home from vacation? I get lots! And I hate that sometimes they go to waste (how many bottles of pili nuts can you eat???). Oh, and I hate that they went on vacation and I stayed home!

I had a bag of tablea tsokolate from Laguna and didn't know what to make of them till I was browsing my old magazines and saw a recipe in Yummy magazine (Nov 2010) for tablea brownies. Problem solved!

Here is the recipe:

In a pan, melt together 1 cup butter and 1 cup chopped tablea tsokolate; cool. In a bowl, whisk together 2 cups sugar, 2 cups flour, and 1 teaspoon salt. Beat 7 large eggs in butter-tablea mixture. Fold in dry ingredients; do not overmix. Transfer to 2 prepared 8X8 inch pans (I used one 9X13 because I don't have 8X8s) and sprinkle with 1/4 cup chopped nuts (I used walnuts) over each pan. Bake in a preheated 350F oven for 30-35 minutes.

The result was a simple, not-too-sweet brownie. Just right! Be warned though that this is not the fudgy, sticky type of brownie. This one is very light and a little dry.

I think I could use these tableas in some of my cake/cupcake recipes some time. They make great chocolate milkshakes too! :-)

Just out of the oven

Closer

Nice :-)

Pawis rating: 2 of 5 very easy!

Caramel Fudge Brownies without the Caramel

For the record, I have tried to make brownies twice and failed. In both cases, I have the bottom part totally burnt into a black, solid base and the top part wet which means it's still hilaw.

So, I figured maybe three's the charm! Yeah right, I was actually thinking, I'm sure I'll mess this up again.

I got this recipe from Yummy's recipe book So-Easy Sweets. I think there were 3 brownie recipes in there but I chose this one because I had all the ingredients at home.

Caramel Fudge Brownies

For the caramel fudge (which I did not do because I don't have corn syrup)
1 1/2 cups sugar
1/2 cup whipping cream
2 tbsps butter
1 tbsp corn syrup
dash of salt

For the brownie
1/2 cup chopped unsweetened chocolate
1/2 cup butter
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
2/3 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup coarsely chopped walnuts
1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chunks or chips

1. In a saucepan, melt sugar until lightly browned. Gradually add cream, then butter and corn syrup. The mixture will form bubbles - just keep stirring until the caramel is smooth and the sugar is completely melted. Simmer for about 30 minutes or until caramel is thick. Remove from heat. The caramel will thicken as it cools.
2. Preheat oven to 350F. Line an 8-inch square pan with aluminum foil then grease the foil. Set aside.
3. In the microwave or in a small pan, heat chocolate and butter together until melted. Remove from heat.
4. Stir in sugar and mix well. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Stir in vanilla.
5. Add flour and mix until well blended.
6. Pour mixture into the prepared pan and bake for 20 to 25 minutes or until done.
7. Spread caramel fudge over baked brownies. Top with nuts and chocolate chunks. Cool.

I tweaked this recipe a bit because I don't like caramel and I don't have corn syrup at home. I followed the instructions for making the brownie, added 2 tbsps of the walnut-chocolate chip combo into the mix and popped into the oven. When the brownie's almost done (top looked cooked but when you insert a toothpick, the middle part is still not done), I took out the pan and sprinkled the rest of the walnut-chocolate chip chunks to cover the whole thing. Then I put the pan back into the oven and waited till it's done.

So, why did I mess up the first 2 times I made brownie? Two things: (1) I did not cover the pan with aluminum foil because my pan is non-stick, and (2) I placed the pan in the lower portion of the oven where it's very hot. This time around I followed the instructions carefully and remembered the tip I see in some recipes I read in the internet (always put the pan in the middle or top part of the oven). Voila! Brownie success!!!

Took the pan out of the oven and sprinkled chocolate chips and nuts on top. Look at the lovely aluminum foil dressup :-)

Pawis rating: 2 of 5 - easy!