Birthday Bash Sweets

I went to a birthday bash and I was in charge of the cupcakes! I seriously hope that means that cupcakes are my gift and I don't owe anyone a gift.

We're celebrating 4 special birthdays so I know I needed to make a lot of cupcakes. I also wanted to make a few flavors because there's going to be kids, parents, and grandparents. The three flavors I decided were (1) chocolate cupcakes with a chocolate frosting because kids love chocolate, (2) beer cupcakes with a beer cream cheese frosting because we have some beer fanatics, and (3) lemon cupcakes with a lemon whipped cream and a candied lemon peel.

*Important Note*
There were tons of food, and when you're going to a party, guess what, the food is FREE!!! That's why I rarely turn down an invitation to anywhere that might have food. Here's some of the things on the menu. May you look at it a drool.

From top left to bottom right: rice, watermelon, stuffed jalapenos, vermicelli rice noodle salad, thai pepper dipping sauce, grilled pig intestines, barbecue pork ribs, grilled spicy Hmong sausages, stuffed chicken wings, lemon cupcakes, beer cupcakes, fruit and yogurt parfait.

The recipe for the lemon cupcakes are posted in a pervious blog post, Happy Lemon Cupcakes. I've made both the chocolate and beer cupcakes before, but I haven't blogged about themyet, so here I go...

Chocolate Cupcakes (adapted from chocolate cake recipe)
1 1/3 cups of cake flour**
1/4 cups of cocoa powder
1 cup of butter
1 1/4 cups of sugar
4 eggs

1. Preheat oven to 350 degree and line bking tray with liners.
2. Mix flour and cocoa powder togther and set aside.
3. cream butter and sugar.
4. Add in the eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each addition.
5. add the flour mix to the batte, in 3 parts.
6. Spoon batter into liners an bake for ~17 minutes. Make sure to always tes cupcake witha toothpick for doneness.

Chocolate Frosting
1/2 cup milk
2 tablespoon flour
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup sugar
3 tablespoons cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon vanilla

1. Heat milk and flour in a pot until thick, stirring constantly so it does not stick. (~3-4 minutes)
2. Transfer milk into a bowl to cool.
3. Cream butter and sugar. (~3-4 minutes)
4. Once flour mix has cooled, add vanilla and beat until smooth. (~3-4 minutes)
5. Mix flour into butter mix and beat until think and creamy (~4-5 minutes)

**I actually did not like the consistency of this frosting too much because it was not as thick as I wanted it to be. Once it came out of the refridgator (I put it in there until I was ready to use it), I became really runny. That's why I didn't take a picture of the cupcake with the frosting, but now I realized I should have so you can see it. If I try this frosting again, you'll be the first to hear about it!

Beer Cupcakes
1 1/2 cups of cake flour**
1 teaspoon of baking powder
1/2 teaspoon of baing soda
3 tablespoons of butter
3/4 cups of packed brown sugar
2 eggs
1 cup of beer (I used Budweiser)

1. Preheat ove to 350 degrees and line baking try with liners.
2. Cream butter and brown sugar.
3. Add eggs, one at a time, to sugar+butter mix.
4. Mix the cake flour and baking powder together, then add 1/3 to the egg mixture.
5. Add 1/2 cup of beer and mix.
6. Repeat steps 4-5 unti all of te flour and beer are used.
7. Spoon batter into liners and bake for ~27 minutes. Make sure to always tes cupcake witha toothpick for doneness.

Beer Cream Cheese Frosting

Ingredients:
4 ounces of cream cheese
1/2 cup of heavy whipping cream
4 tablespoons of sugar, divided

1. Beat heavy whipping cream  and 3 tablespoons of sugar until soft peaks.
2. Beat cream cheese and 1 tablespoon of sugar until soft.
3. Mix 2 tablepoons of beer into the cream cheese. (Make sure you taste the cream cheese not to make sure there's enough ber for your taste. The whipped cream should not cover too much of the bee flavor.)
5. Fold whipped cream into cream cheese, in 3 parts.

**If you do not have any cake flour, simply add 2 tablespoons of cornstarch for every  cup of flour you use. In this case, 3 tablespoons of cornstarch. Make sure that you take out the equivalent measurement of flour. Since we added 3 tablespoons of corn starch, we must take out 3 tablespoons of flour.

I know I said to reference the lemon cupcake post for the recipe and that I woudn't talk about it, but I actually made some edible decorations for the lemon cupcakes and I wanted to share it with y'all! I made some candied lemon peels to go atop the cupcakes.

Ingredients:
1 lemon
1 cup water
3/4 cup sugar

1. Cut lemon in half, juice the lemon and reserve the peel and juice. (We're only using the peel.)
2. Cover lemon peels in cold water and bring to a boil; let boil for 3 mintues.
3. Drain lemon peels.
4. Repeat steps 2 and 3 two more times.
5. After the 3rd time boiling the lemon peel, let them rest to cool.
6. Remove the inside of the lemons, leaving only the rind.
7. Cut lemon peel into small strips. (Mine were about 1/8 inch, maybe a bit smaller).
8. Return lemon rinds into pot, cover with 1 cup of cold water and add sugar. Bring to boil. Let simmer for 3 hours.
****Very important, do not let the liquid turn brown, that means you're burning your lemon peels. If your reduction start to dry up, add a little bit of water. When you're all done (after 3 hours) the peel would be translucent
9. Remove lemon peel and let it cool for ~8 hours.
10. Roll lemon peels in sugar and serve!

Price breakdown:
FREE!!! I actually have all these ingredients already since this is not my first time making these two prticular cupcakes. Let's pretend you follow this blog and have made the previous cupcakes and have these basic ingredients in stock already.