The Beginning

I have always loved cooking. I watch the Food Network religiously. Eventually I got to a stage where I would see recipes and think, "I can totally make that." So, I would prep and cook. As it turns out, I am pretty good at cooking. There are two things that I love most about cooking: it is therapeutic and it makes people happy when you cook for them. I developed a deep love for cooking. Eventually, I became tired of just watching the Food Network and started reading Bon Appetit magazine and would try to mimic their beautiful, gourmet meals. As I became better and better at cooking I began to daydream about, in my opinion, one of the hardest parts about cooking: baking. Cooking is more of an art. You get to decide what and how much you want to omit from or add to a recipe. However, baking is a science. The timing needs to be perfect and the measurements exact. As a science major, I find baking natural.

I have been baking and cooking for a couple years now and my friends and family have always seemed to enjoy my goods. I have also practiced enough that I have learned how to incorporate my own ideas into already published recipes. So I figured it was about time to see what all this blogging was about. So I will post what I make. I use my friends in the Genetics major at Rutgers University as my guinea pigs.

Banana Butterscotch Cupcakes with Brown Sugar Butter Frosting (Makes 12 cupcakes)

This cupcake was very, very easy to make! The original inspiration was from the book cupcakes! by Elinor Klivans.

CUPCAKES
1 1/4 cups flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons butter (I use salted butter because I think that it adds more flavor, but the author calls for unsalted butter)
1 cup sugar
2 medium over-ripe bananas, mashed together in a separate bowl
2 large eggs
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 cup buttermilk
3/4 cup butterscotch chips (The author called for a full cup, but add as many as you would like)

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.  Line the muffin tin with cupcake liners.  I find that the foil liners keep in the moisture in the cupcake. Mix together the butter, sugar, and bananas.  Add the eggs one at a time.  In a separate bowl, mix together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt.  Mix in the flour mixture slowly to the banana mixture.  Add the buttermilk to the mixture.  Then add in the vanilla extract.  I find that it is necessary to add the vanilla extract last because if you add it too early the flavor will not be as strong by the end.  Mix in your desired amount of butterscotch chips.

The mixture should look something like this:

Then you pour this mixture into the cupcake liners, about 3/4 way up.

You bake them at 350 degrees F for about 20 minutes, until you can poke a toothpick into the cupcake and it will come out with dry crumbs on it.  Mine took about 18 minutes.  If you are new to baking then I would set your timer to 10 minutes and then check the cupcakes every 2 minutes after the 10 minutes until you see that they are done.

The final product should look something like this:

 

I then cut a hole into the middle of the cupcakes in order to fill them.

BROWN SUGAR BUTTER FROSTING
1/4 cup half-and-half
3/4 cup packed light brown sugar
1/2 butter, at room temperature (This is IMPORTANT!  The butter should be very very soft)
1 cup powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract


Put the half-and-half and light brown sugar into a medium saucepan and heat until the brown sugar melts.  Increase the heat and boil the mixture for about a minute.  It is important to stir this constantly.  You know you are doing this right when your mixture looks like this:

Let this mixture cool in the fridge for about 45 minutes.

After the mixture is cool, mix together the butter and powdered sugar, adding the powdered sugar to the butter about 1/4 cup at a time, until the mixture is fluffy.  While the mixer is still on, slowly add the brown sugar mixture to the butter mixture.  Finally, add the vanilla extract.  The frosting should look like this:

Then frost your cupcakes however you want them to look!

My friends and family found these cupcakes to be delicious!  So you should definitely try them.  I think the best part of these cupcakes is the frosting and I will definitely be using this frosting to put on anything.  Seriously.  I can easily make a batch and eat it straight.


The Devil's Tears Vegetarian Lentil Chili (Makes 8 servings)

I figured I would close off this blog with a meal that I cook a lot.  Being a vegetarian, I find myself missing a lot of foods that I used to eat that contained meat.  One of those things is chili.  I found a great recipe in Bon Appetit magazine a few years ago and I make this chili  all the time.  The great thing about chili is that you can add whatever vegetables you want to it and it will just get more delicious (and nutritious).  My brother named this The Devil's Tears Chili because I like my chili like I like my hell--as hot as can come.  So if you want to change up the heat level, and make it more suitable for a little baby, then I would recommend decreasing the amount of cayenne pepper, mustard, and sriracha that I use.

4 teaspoons olive oil
1 cup chopped onion
6 garlic cloves, minced
1/2 cup chopped carrots (Not in the original recipe)
4 tablespoons chili powder
2 tablespoons ground cumin
2 teaspoon dried oregano
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper (I add about a teaspoon because I like it fiery hot)
8 cups of water
2 cups lentils
1 cup tomato puree
1 cup corn (Not in the original recipe)
Chopped scallions
Shredded cheese of choice

Of course, you can make a smaller chili than this but I was feeding 6 people so I figured I would make enough for left-overs.  Heat the oil in a very large saucepan on medium-high.  Add the onions, carrots, and garlic and sautee for a couple minutes.  Then add the chili powder, cumin, oregano and cayenne pepper.  Cook this for about 1 minute.  Add the water, lentils, and tomato puree.  Bring this mixture to a boil.  Reduce the heat to a medium-low and simmer for about 45 minutes, or until the lentils are fully cooked.  Add the corn and cook for another 5 minutes.  It should look something like this:

Put it into serving bowls and sprinkle some scallions and cheese on top.  I only had mozzarella!

It's really delicious and very easy to make.  Who needs meat, right!?  (But you can add meat too if you want..whatever.)

I am making some other cupcakes and some cookies today..so hopefully they will be just as good!  I'll tell you ALL about it later!

Stacey