Witches Hat

As I said last night, I had thought up of two ideas for a Halloween cupcake, this would be the second idea.

This cupcake is very easy to make as you can see, but it would be super cute to make with your kids on Halloween.

This is a chocolate on chocolate cupcake, my mom's recipe of course, with a milk chocolate Hershey's Kiss in the center. Around the base of the kiss and around it, I decorated it with orange frosting to make it look like a bow attached to the witches hat.

I feel bad using the word "I" in this blog because my husband was right there with me the whole time, from beginning to end. He helped bake the cupcakes, make the frosting and he even had his hand on decorating. The bow is his handy work =)

This will be my last Halloween cupcake for the year. Who knows what ideas may pop up next time around. I'll be focusing on some sort of Thanksgiving cupcake and of course a special project for my husbands upcoming 25th birthday, November 17th. I love you Travis.

For ordering information please visit me on Facebook, Cupcakes By Coley.

Photography: Travis. J Premo

Perfect for a kids Halloween Party

Well I seem to be on a "seasonal kick" as far as ideas go. This past week I made Pumpkin Spice Cupcakes as you remember, which made me think what else can I make for the Halloween season?

Well I thought of two ideas, one of which I tried tonight. (The other I'll save for tomorrow)

One of my husbands all time snacks are, dirt cups. Yes, I'm talking about chocolate pudding, cool whip, oreos and gummy worms. Nothing extravagant, just a simple dessert that brings him back to being a kid. Ive made it several times for him, but I thought, "How can I make this into a cupcake??" The worms fit perfectly into the Halloween theme.

So what I did, was I used my moms chocolate cake recipe, and added oreos into the batter. I then made a standard vanilla butter cream and added cocoa. Top it off with some gummy worms and crushed oreos for decorations, and you have a pretty cute idea for a kids Halloween party at school or something.

It could even be used as buying the cupcakes, and having the kids frosting their own and decorating it with how they want. Kids love that sort of stuff during school parties.

$1 each or $10 for a dozen. 10% of all proceeds will go to Breast Cancer Research

Photography: Travis J. Premo

Think Awareness

Tonights cupcake comes from an inspiration from the cookbook Ive been working from. Instead of silver candy balls I used sprinkles. This made them look more like my company logo =)

They are your classic vanilla cupcake with a confectioners sugar frosting with pink food coloring.

Since the vanilla cupcake is one Ive struggled with in the past, I was sure to cook them for less time. I baked them for 18 minutes instead of the usual twenty. They didnt brown ontop which I like. So I now know that the 18-19 minute mark is when they do start to brown ontop, and that is a no no in my world.

These cupcakes, as well with the others are now available for ordering. Since it's October and its Breast Cancer Awareness Month, I'm running a special. For the rest of the month 10% of all proceeds will go to Breast Cancer Research. (This of course is proceeds from all cupcakes, not just these.)

Photography: Travis J. Premo

My 50th Cupcake

So on Cupcakes by Coley's fan page via Facebook I asked my fans which recipe I should make for my 50th cupcake. The winner? Pumpkin, with a cream cheese frosting.

This particular one did not come from the cookbook. Why there wasn't a pumpkin recipe within the 500 cupcakes beats me. I personally think one of the nonfat or dairy free ones could have been replaced with pumpkin...

Anyway, the recipe was a huge success and turned out perfect. My husband and myself agreed that the texture was perfect and I did pretty well with the baking time.

The recipe has some great spices that made it come alive. For example, cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice and a few others that I wont go into great deal in case these turn up in my future bakery. =)

It said to bake for 20-25 minutes, and knowing my oven I baked for 20 with the suggestion of Travis. I cant wait to move out of this apartment. We'll be moving into my mother in-laws condo, she's letting us rent it out, which will be a huge help. The oven in that place in is twice as big, and a lot less shall I say...crappy.

These cupcakes are now available for ordering: $1 each or $10 for a dozen.

Please contact:

Coley at:

CupcakesbyColey@hotmail.com

or visit my website:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Santa-Clarita-CA/Cupcakes-by-Coley/143205672827?ref=ts#/pages/Santa-Clarita-CA/Cupcakes-by-Coley/143205672827?v=wall&ref=ts

Photography: Travis J. Premo

Are These Real?

"Are these real?" Travis asks. "What do you mean by real?" I respond. "Meaning they don't have any dates, they aren't gluten-free, they actually have fat in them..?" he adds. "haha yes, they are real"

My next challenge comes from page 167 in the cookbook, and they are actually muffins, not cupcakes, but its in the book-so I gotta do it.

These next ones are apple & cinnamon muffins. They were super easy to make. Flour, sugar....damn it as I type this blog I realize the next ingredient is baking powder and I forgot to add it into the mixture. Too late now, they are in the oven as we speak. grr! Anyway, the rest of the ingredients are cinnamon, vegetable oil, sweet butter (melted), eggs, buttermilk, and two apples, peeled, cored and finely diced.

Ugh, I hope they at least taste okay, I cant believe I forgot the baking powder. I'm sure most people probably wouldn't even blog about how they forgot, but this blog is all about learning experiences. Besides I have three other attempts to this recipe, I'm bound to get it right at least once, right?

5 minutes left on the timer...I'm anxious to get these suckers out of there.

Well, they look OK. Time will only tell.

So they've cooled down, and my husband and I sampled some...the verdict? Well they're very tasty but the texture is way off. The muffin kind of sticks to the inside of your mouth, after taste tastes like theres something missing. Which there is. Better luck next time.

Photography: Travis J. Premo

Number 48!

This is one of my favorite recipes, hands down.

My 48th cupcake does not come from the cookbook, but from my mommy. My mom has been making this killer chocolate on chocolate cake for years. A favorite of my brother and I, and my husband joined the band wagon a few years ago. It's moist and delicious and will for sure be in my future bakery. (Mommy will get a cut, of course!)

This recipe is so good, I wanted to try to make it into cupcake form. My first attempt went pretty well.

The recipe originally says it will make two 9-inch layer pans or a 13 x 9-inch pan. Which turned into two dozen cupcakes! yum yum!

The recipe goes on to say to bake for twenty minutes. Now since this was my first attempt, I didn't want to alter any temperatures or timing. So that's what I did. I baked at 350 degrees for twenty minutes.

They seemed delicious to me, but Travis suggested baking them a little less next time. So I'll take the suggestion and bake them for 18 minutes and see what happens.

For business reasons, I will not reveal the recipe, you'll have to buy them at my bakery one day. =) Just take my word, they are awesome.

Amanda, got to sample one for her birthday on Sunday. They were a day old at that point, but she got the idea.

Stay tuned! Number 49 is in the works! Hint: apple

Photography: Travis J. Premo

A cup of tea

Let me start off by saying, these next cupcakes I didn't actually bake tonight. I made them a couple of days ago but I haven't had the chance to blog about them until now.

This next cupcake comes from the fragrant & spiced section of the cookbook. They are called chai cupcakes. "Chai is a spiced Indian tea made with frothy warm milk." The cupcake was pretty light and have a spicy flavor.

This recipe calls for self rising flour, baking powder, salt, chai tea powder, sweet butter, brown sugar, egg whites, and buttermilk.

All the ingredients were easy except the chai tea powder. Go figure. After searching several markets, including Whole Foods I still couldn't find a powder version of the tea so I went for tea bags instead and cut them open to get to the spices. The recipe didn't call for that much to begin with. One tablespoon is all you'll need.

Bake for the usual 20 minutes at 350 degrees and you've got yourself a surprisingly good cupcake. When its cooled you top with a cream cheese frosting. I skipped this step for the soul propose of, I already know how to make that frosting, and didn't want to waste ingredients. Not to mention the author of the book portrays the cupcake without frosting, and so will I. I think it may taste weird with it, but who knows. It tastes just fine plain. Perhaps when I make the variation I'll throw some frosting on there.

I give this cupcake a B+

Photography: Travis J. Premo

A healthier alternative

Well once again I have been neglecting my little cupcake project, and I apologize. There just doesnt seem to be enough hours in the day anymore. So I decided to make one of the more "interesting" cupcakes, mainly to get it out of the way. Tonight I made gluten-free pecan cupcakes with chopped dates. You can find gluten-free flour at your local health food store. I found this one at Whole Foods. (One of my favorite places to visit) I was pretty interested in making this one. I had some suggestions to make a gluten free cupcake, and wanted to see what it was all about. This cupcake can be found toward the end of the book in the "cupcakes for special diets" section. The cupcake was super easy to make, gluten free flour, sugar, eggs, butter, milk, vanilla, chopped pecans, chopped dates, salt, and baking powder. Bake at 400 degrees for twenty minutes. I think twenty minutes was three minutes too much. They were a little over done. They were also a pain in the you know what to remove from the pan. I used Pam to grease the muffin pan, but maybe some flour in addition to it wouldnt hurt. I dont want to give up on the gluten free aspect of things. I think it can be a really good market....with the right recipe. These however...were no bueno. As my husband said "ugh it tastes like dirt!" That it why there is no picture...I cant even feed these to the homeless or less fortunate. They were so bad. The dates just took over the cupcake. So gross. My next gluten free attempt will be: gluten free macadamia nut and raisin muffins. I'll need to buy soya bran. (What's soya bran?)

Sorry it's been so long

I cant believe I let five days go by without baking. There just always something on this baker's plate.

Well it's Sunday, so I can use that to my advantage and bake a few in order to catch up.

For the first cupcake of the day, I did one of the variations to one I have already made. I made white chocolate & macadamia nut brioche.

These were much better then the originals, "chocolate chip and raisin". At least my husband thought so.

These seemed a little over cooked, so for my next variation I'll be sure to bake them for less time. Maybe 18 minutes rather then 20.

I did better on the yeast part. I think last time I used to hot of water and killed the poor little guys. The dough seemed to rise perfectly this time around.

Well Cupcakes by Coley will be having its very own Facebook page. Hopefully this will make it easier for people to visit the blog. I'll put a direct link onto the page, along with photos and a contact number and email for anyone looking to place an order. I think this way, if you want to become a fan of my blog or page you don't have to create a yahoo account. So keep your eye out for that. It's coming along nicely.

Photography: Travis J. Premo