Matcha Harmony Cupcake v. 2 - buttery cupcake made with matcha powder, iced with white chocolate truffle flavored with matcha and topped with a white chocolate disc with a handmade imprint of the Japanese calligraphy character “harmony”. Now at reduced price!
same delicious taste at reduced price
I finally managed to check out the Japanese grocery stores in Cartimar after a recent visit there. My heart skipped a beat and I think I jumped a little from excitement when I discovered in the last store I entered a pack that appeared to be matcha. Though I could not understand the writing on the pack, the pictures told the story.
So I bought some and as soon as I got home, I prepared it the traditional way. It tasted pretty good, not as flavorful as the high-grade that I buy from Japan but good enough. There is also no trace of bitterness that usually characterizes lower grade tea. I thought it would work well with cupcakes and to my delight, it did—I was impressed! The taste is comparable to my original matcha cupcakes though the color is a lighter green. This is truly heaven sent! I will be using this matcha for my baked goods from now on. And since I don’t have to buy direct from Japan (no more expensive shipping charges!) that means the price of my Matcha Harmony Cupcakes will be greatly reduced.
Another thing I like about this matcha is that it comes in 1-gram foil packets. Aside from being convenient, I only have to open the packets I need so I get fresh matcha every time. Whereas in the traditional packaging, once you open it, you have to consume the matcha within several days or else the delicate flavor will begin to diminish.
The cupcakes made with this matcha still taste like Haagen-Dazs green tea ice cream. So what’s not to love? 
October 7th, 2009
Vanilla Bean Heaven Cupcake - soft vanilla bean cupcake frosted with whipped white chocolate ganache and topped with a chocolate crescent moon. Price available upon request.
real vanilla
I am not really a fan of vanilla but when vanilla beans became readily available here, I thought it’s time I add vanilla cupcakes to my repertoire. I developed my own version—soft and light, just the way I like it. In addition to the vanilla bean, I also used vanilla sugar to further boost the vanilla flavor.
I chose to frost this with white chocolate ganache that is not cloyingly sweet (only 3 ounces of chocolate per 1 cup of cream) because white chocolate also has shades of vanilla. I whipped the ganache to match the cupcake’s delicate flavor and light texture. And I think a chocolate crescent moon is the perfect topper for this ethereal dessert.
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the real thing
Vanilla may seem like a common flavoring but do you know that it is the second most expensive spice after saffron? Real vanilla, that is. But why is it so expensive?
Growing vanilla is so labor-intensive. A member of the orchid family, it was originally cultivated in Mexico and can only be pollinated by the Melipone bee which is endemic to that country. When vanilla was brought outside Mexico, the vines grew but did not bear any fruit because no other insect would pollinate the flowers. Several attempts to transport the Melipone bees proved futile. It took a 12-year-old slave named Edmond Albius to develop a simple method of hand pollination and that led to the successful cultivation of the plant outside Mexico. That method is still being used today and it is the only way to produce fruits without the bees.
The vanilla flower also just blooms for a day so growers are always rounding out the farm for open flowers. And each flower must be hand-pollinated within 12 hours of opening. Harvesting the bean is also as labor-intensive as pollinating the flowers. Each pod must be picked by hand just as its end begins to split to ensure the finest flavor.
Vanillin, one of several hundred aromatic components of vanilla, can be produced synthetically making it a cheaper alternative to the real extract. Cooks Illustrated conducted an experiment comparing natural and artificial vanilla extracts in prepared food. The experiment concluded that if you use vanilla mainly for baking, imitation vanilla is at par with the real thing, but natural vanilla is best for custards, ice creams and savory dishes. I think in the end, it depends on one’s preference: if you want vanilla to be the standout flavor and you have the budget, then go for the real thing.
October 2nd, 2009
Atis Delight Cupcake -soft cupcake with the distinctive sweet taste of ripe atis (sugar apple) and bits of fresh atis pulp. Frosted with plump dots of slightly sweetened whipped cream. Price available upon request.
the (sweet) fruit of my labor
I finally did it! An atis cupcake that has real atis flavor. I am very proud of this creation because a lot of my friends were intrigued when I told them about this project. Atis in a cupcake? Bacon in a cupcake sounds stranger to me! This cupcake perfectly captures the distinctive sweet taste of atis and it smells like one, too. My good friend D._ said biting into a chunk of atis pulp (deseeded, of course) was a delicious surprise. The cupcake also has a nice pinkish tinge.
I was inspired to create this cupcake after reading about a popular avocado cake being sold somewhere in Manila that has garnered rave reviews. I thought it was a great idea but one made with atis might be even better. Besides, I have easy access to the fruit as we have a prolific atis tree in our backyard. And they are nothing like the puny, blackened, sorry little things available in the market or grocery stores.
Although we eat atis fresh from our tree, we cannot have the fruits on demand. There is the usual waiting game and sometimes we play this game with the birds and bats that also feast on the fruits even if they aren’t ripe yet. I thought of freezing the pulp so whenever I need some (for the cupcakes) I can just reach for my stash in the freezer. So I put some deseeded, pre-measured pulp in a ziplock bag, pressed the air out and stored it in the freezer. After a week, I used the thawed pulp in the cupcakes. It worked wonderfully well and was as good as fresh.
I would rank this as one of my favorite cupcakes because of its unique, incomparable flavor and light texture. And hey, atis is one of my favorite fruits as well!
September 30th, 2009
Citrusy Sunflower Cupcakes - soft cupcakes flavored with freshly squeezed orange and lemon juices and crunchy poppy seeds. Iced with semisweet chocolate glaze and decorated with marshmallow petals dipped in yellow sugar. With a sprinkling of mini chocolate chips in the center. Price available upon request.
more flavors to come!
It slipped my mind that this blog just turned a year old this August. Wow. And I thought I would have ran out of cupcake ideas within a year’s time. The truth is, I have a growing list of cupcake flavors that I want to try. One of my recent successful experiments was the atis (sugar apple) cupcake. I am still improving on it though and I still haven’t thought of an appropriate frosting so stay tuned. My niece M._, the middle of our family’s tres Marias, also requested a ginger cupcake so this flavor is in the queue as well.
I have been working on citrus flavors lately. I was happy with my orange cupcake and calamansi cupcake. Next up, the tried and tested orange and lemon combo.
Most of the recipes for citrus cakes call for poppy seeds so I decided I want those in these cupcakes as well. I just didn’t know where to get them. The bakery supply store I go to has stopped stocking it. What to do, what to do? Since my search was becoming futile by the day, I put this project in the back burner and started on other flavors in my list. After several months or so, I chanced upon a blog that mentioned that poppy seeds are available at Santis Deli—wonderful!
I used my orange cupcake recipe (an iteration of a sour cream cupcake that I have been using to create other flavors as well), replacing half of the orange juice and zest with lemon juice and zest. While the baked cupcakes were flavorful and moist, they didn’t rise as much. I never had this problem with the orange cupcake so I was bewildered. What worked after several tests was an adjustment in the amount of baking soda—I doubled it. For the chocolate glaze on top, I used semisweet chocolate which perfectly complemented the citrus flavor of the cupcake.
I could not find any yellow marshmallows to make the sunflower petals so I just dipped the white ones in yellow sugar crystals. A better alternative I should say as the sugar added a nice sparkle and shine to the “flower.” If you don’t have any colored sugar on hand but have food coloring, you can make your own. Put enough sugar in a small, clear plastic bag such as a ziplock bag and add small drops of food color (liquid or gel are fine). Seal the bag and massage the sugar until the color evens out. I thought of using chocolate sprinkles in the center to resemble the sunflower seeds but the mini chocolate chips look better and taste better.
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the poppy seed drug test
Hold that poppy seed bagel if you are applying for a job or a driver’s license and have a scheduled drug test coming up. That inocuous treat can show up in the test as—gasp!—morphine.
Poppy seeds used in culinary dishes come from Papaver somniferum, aka the opium poppy. Yes, it is the same plant from which opium is extracted. Although opium is produced by “milking” the seed pods rather than the seeds, all parts of the plant can still contain opium alkaloids such as morphine and codeine. Therefore, if you still insist on eating that poppy seed bagel prior to your urinalysis, it can result to a false positive. In the US people have been fired, job applicants rejected and lawsuits filed because of poppy seed influenced-drug test results. To weed out the false positives, the test threshold for morphine and codeine have been raised from 300 nanograms (ng)/milliliter (mL) to 2,000 ng/mL. I just don’t know if these problems have been encountered here in the Philippines. Probably not as poppy seeds-studded food are not exactly staples here.
Wait, since the seeds have traces of opium alkaloids, can that poppy seed-covered bagel make you high? No. The seeds have very low level of opiates and because they are contained in food, there is no danger of you suddenly bursting into a giggling frenzy even if you eat a whole poppy seed cake.
Sources: The Straight Dope, Wikipedia, Snopes.com
September 6th, 2009
Calamansi Cloud Cupcake - buttery cupcake intensely flavored with real calamansi juice and zest. Iced with calamansi curd cloud cream and topped with a glittering calamansi gelee. Price available upon request.
a healthy dose of vitamin c
After successfully creating an orange cupcake, I was inspired to do a calamansi-flavored one. This cupcake has lots of freshly-squeezed calamansi juice and finely grated calamansi rind. This is a bit heavier than my orange cupcake but it is moist and has a melt-in-the-mouth quality.
I iced the cupcakes with calamansi curd cloud which is heavy cream whipped with calamansi curd. I made my favorite lemon curd recipe but subbed the juice with calamansi. While some do not add the zest to the strained curd, I always include it to intensify the tang. The tiny green specks also contrast nicely with the yellowness of the curd.
The topper is a calamansi gelee which I adapted from a recipe that used lime juice. I got the recipe from a candy book that our neighbor S._ gave me several Christmases ago. It is very easy to make although sometimes books do not really give detailed instructions and one must rely on visual and olfactory cues to know if you’re doing things right or bungling the job. Lesson I learned from this candy project: cook over low heat. I found out that even with a candy thermometer, the sugar syrup can burn if one is not careful.
This cupcake is definitely different. Those who are partial to sweet desserts might not like the tart kick. With loads of calamansi flavor, savoring this cupcake almost seems like taking your daily dose of vitamin C!
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the little gadget that could
One of my favorite kitchen gadgets is the microplane zester. Its sharp teeth grate citrus rinds so fine that the zest is not a distraction to the palate. Originally a woodworking tool, it has found a permanent place in the kitchen after a homemaker in Ottawa used her husband’s new tool to zest an orange needed for her cake.
The microplane can also be used to grate spices and cheeses and even shave rock salt. I’m sure you are all familiar with beauty experts’ advice to look to the kitchen for some quick, effective fix for skin care emergencies (cucumber slices to soothe the eyes, a mixture of cocoa, honey and olive oil to create a color reviving mask for dark hair, and so on). Add the microplane to that list as there is a new range of models that can be used to exfoliate cracked, dry skin of the feet. Seriously. You can check it out here. Just remember, if you use one for zesting, don’t use it for any other job!
July 24th, 2009
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