April has been such a busy month! So I've been a little slow with the baking, but I made some pretty awesome things last week. I wanted to be a little more adventurous with my cooking so I tried cupcakes with an unusual frosting and some Thai food, which I have never made before.
Chocolate Sour Cream Cupcakes with Chocolate Mousse and Fudge Drizzle
CUPCAKES
3 ounces unsweetened chocolate, chopped up
1 stick salted butter (you can use unsalted)
1 1/4 cups sugar
2 large eggs
1 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup sour cream
1/2 cup water
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Melt the chocolate in a double boiler and set to the side to cool slightly. Beat the butter and sugar together. Add the eggs, one at a time. Add the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt and stir until well blended. Add the sour cream and water. Then add the vanilla extract. Line the cupcake tins with cupcake liners and fill the liners with about 1/3 of the batter. Here is the mistake that I made..I kind of filled the cupcake liners all the way to the top. This batter makes about 18 cupcakes, but I only had 12 cupcake liners and I didn't want to waste any batter. After baking the cupcakes for about 18 minutes my cupcakes looked like this:
As you can see, these cupcakes are massive. They overflowed and this would normally be fun, but the cupcake I was trying to make was supposed to have the top cut off and put back on after mousse was put int he middle. There was no way I was going to successfully cut that top off without the cupcake completely breaking, unless I had some sort of magical powers...which I don't (?)
CHOCOLATE SAUCE
3/4 cup heavy whipping cream
2 tablespoons salted butter
1 1/2 cupcs semisweet chocolate chips
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
Heat the cream and butter in a medium-sized saucepan on medium-high heat until the mixture begins to bubble, but do not let it boil. Take the mixture off of the heat and add the chocolate chips. Let the chocolate chips sit in the mixture for about a minute and mix the chocolate chips and cream until it is smooth. Add the vanilla extract. I let this mixture cool at room-temperature for about an hour before using. It should look like this.
CHOCOLATE MOUSSE
3/4 cup Chocolate Sauce from before
1 1/4 cups heavy whipping cream
2 tablespoons powdered sugar
Beat the heavy cream with the powdered sugar until you form stiff peaks. Add the chocolate sauce slowly while mixing on low speed. Some people fold the whipped cream into the chocolate, but my wrists are very weak and so was that excuse. Anywho..I use a mixer.
Instead of putting the mousse on the inside I just spread it on top of the cupcakes and then drizzled the cupcakes with the remaining chocolate sauce by putting the chocolate sauce in a plastic bag, cutting the tip off, and drawing lines on the cupcakes. They didn't look how I wanted them to, but I still think they looked pretty and they were, by far, the best tasting chocolate cupcakes I have ever made.
Refrigerate the cupcakes in order to solidify the mousse. Mousse tends to run.
Thai Red Curry Tofu with Green Beans
I love Thai food and I love tofu, but it is really difficult to make tofu actually taste like something other than tofu, especially for people who aren't vegetarians, like my family. A lot of people do not like tofu, but I think that this dish would be able to please anyone.
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
2 large onions, finely chopped
12 oz firm tofu, cut into 1 inch cubes
2 tablespoons Thai red curry paste (you can find this in the foreign food section of any grocery store)
14 oz tomato puree (I used tomato puree because I hate big chunky tomatoes, which the recipe called for..use whatever you prefer!)
11 oz green beans, trimmed and cut into half
Heat the oil in a wok (or a large frying pan) on high heat. Add the onions and the tofu and saute for about 5 minutes, or until the tofu is golden. Remove the onion and tofu. To the pan, add the curry paste and cook for about one minute. Add the tomatoes and bring the mixture to a boil. Add the green beans and the tofu and onion mixture. Heat this for about 5 more minutes and you're ready to eat!
This meal was so easy to make and it was really really tasty (and, may I add, SUPER healthy)! If you don't want to eat tofu then you can just cut whatever meat you want. It's very versatile. Add however much salt you want at the end.
Tomorrow is Easter so I will be cooking up a storm for the family!!
See you then!
Stacey
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