Thursday, March 17, 2011

Chocolate Chip Irish Creme Cupcakes with Bailey's Buttercream Frosting


Happy St. Patrick's Day! 

If you have Irish heritage, I'm sure you've been looking forward to this day for a while. It's a great day to eat stew or corn beef and cabbage, and drink lots of beer! Since we aren't as young as we once were and can't drink ourselves silly anymore  we don't have a lot of Irish heritage, we don't really make a big deal of St. Patrick's Day. I did want to do something though, so I decided to bake something...shocking, I know! I found this post from Recipe Girl (one of my favorite go-to blogs) for Irish Creme Cupcakes with Bailey's Buttercream frosting. How could I say no to that? We LOVE Bailey's around here, only we tend to only drink it around Christmas time for some reason.

So first I had to go the ABC store, because we didn't have any Bailey's on hand. I decided to buy some Creme de Menthe as well to maybe put on top of the frosting (which didn't turn out so well). The only other thing I needed was mini-chocolate chips, which was easily remedied with a quick trip to Walmart. Let the baking begin!

Fresh out of the the oven
The cupcakes baked up nice and moist. I think that this was the first time I've made cupcakes with cream cheese in the batter, and I loved it! :)   The frosting is basically a simple buttercream with 4 Tbsp. of Bailey's in it. Did I mention these aren't for children? The Bailey's flavor is definitely stronger in the frosting, but it is oh so yummy!  I sprinkled the frosting with green sugar and then made these cupcake toppers from TomKat Studios and voila! The perfect adult cupcake for St. Patrick's Day!

Tuesday, March 1, 2011

Hoo Are You? from Night Owl Crafting


NightOwlCrafting

Night Owl Crafting is hosting Hoo Are You? #34 
Visit her blog if you want to play along! 

Here are this week's questions 
(and my answers)

1. Do you make a budget and keep it, or just fly by the seat of your pants?
We have a vague budget, i.e. don't spend more than you make! 

2. Do you do spring cleaning and if so which month?
We "spring" clean when the mood strikes, or when I can't stand it any longer!

3. Are you a yard sale lover and do you have them and go to them?
I only have yard sales when the entire neighborhood has a joint sale. I don't typically go to yard sales either.

4. What do you take when you have a headache?
I take whatever is closest..Tylenol, Aleve or Advil. 

5. Name 3 things that you feel lucky to have in your life!
I fell very luck to have 3 happy and healthy little boys. They are my light! 
I also feel lucky to have a wonderful husband and a great group of friends!

Recipe Review: Cinnamon Roll Pancakes from Recipe Girl

First thing this morning I turned on my computer and looked at my Google Reader, which pulls in new blog posts from the blogs I subscribe to. The first one to catch my eye was from Recipegirl.com. She shared a recipe for Cinnamon roll pancakes in honor of National Pancake Day! Who knew there was such a day? I sure didn't, but I'm glad Recipe Girl did!

I decided to make these for dinner since I didn't have enough ingredients on hand to make them for breakfast. Come to think of it, all I was missing was enough butter, but I stocked up on a few other essentials like milk, eggs, and powdered sugar. Fortunately, I did so without having to leave the house! My sweet hubby stopped at the store on the way home and got here just in time for me to make the yummy cream cheese glaze.

I wish I had the forethought to take pictures of these while I was making them, but Recipegirl did a great job with hers. Check them out when you click to find the recipe! There were a couple of steps to this recipe, but none of it was difficult. Put some stuff in a bowl, and wisk it together. Then put some more stuff in another bowl, and wisk it. So easy!!!

The hard part was coordinating all of the steps. I'm usually a baker, not a cook, so my timing is not always good. I made the batter and the cinnamon/sugar "filling" before I started cooking the pancakes but had to wait for butter to make the glaze. I tried to put the filling in a plastic bag and didn't cut the hole big enough  so the bag busted when I squeezed too hard. Then I tried a pastry bag with a piping tip, and the tip wasn't big enough. I changed out the tip and thinned the filling with a little milk and finally made it all work before I burned the pancakes.

The mess occurred when I flipped the pancakes. I'm not sure if I did something wrong, like maybe had the heat of the stove too high, but the cinnamon filling oozed all over the griddle when I flipped the pancakes. It then started to smoke  after I removed the pancakes. Fortunately, by that time, I had run out of filling and we were making the rest of the pancakes without. So my hubby cleaned the griddle and we started fresh. I put the already cooked pancakes in a messy stack on a plate (burning my thumb on boiling sugar) and put them in the microwave on warm, (probably not my best idea!). When I took them out to serve, they were all stuck together by warm, goey cinnamon. Thankfully, my kids don't mind messy. I gave them each a few cinnamon roll  pancakes and topped them with the cream cheese glaze and they were instantly in heaven...a few minutes later, the bacon was ready!

Both of my older kids (the ones who talk) said this was their very favorite pancake recipe they'd ever had. My oldest son just went on and on about how good they were. Hubby was really wowed by the cream cheese glaze too! I have to admit, that the finished product was well worth the effort and I am glad I tried it!  Next time though, I'll be putting the batter into muffin cups and stirring in the cinnamon filling before baking, or maybe sprinkling it on top.

Let me know if you make some of these! I'd love to hear about it!

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