In the Kitchen: Salted Caramel Cupcakes

Since the sea salt trend exploded on the baking and sweets front, I'd always been curious about it. It just sounds so darn fancy, doesn't it? When I decided to "launch" this blog for my Writer's Craft class, I wanted to make something fancy, you know, to show that I was serious. Interestingly enough, I had actually planned to make Salted Caramel Macarons. But because macarons are made with ground almond, I was concerned about the risk of allergic reactions, and therefore had to switch it up. Salted Caramel Cupcakes seemed like something a 'foodie' would eat and make, so I decided to try my hands at it. This is what I ended up with.

These cupcakes took me about four hours to make. From the cake batter to the fancy sugar - it's a buttload of work. This recipe is perfect for a relaxing afternoon and tastes pretty great if you make them correctly (which I half did). The recipe I used was from Sprinkle Bakes. The pictures of the cupcakes make me want to faint with their beauty. Keep in mind that this recipe is for 15 regular sized cupcakes. I used it for mini cupcakes but nothing should change except the cooking time. I also modified some parts of the baking instructions to fit what I did. I baked them for 18 - 22 minutes, but of course, that differs based on the temperature of your oven, etc. Basically, just use common sense. When you think they're done, poke one with toothpick right at the centre. If it comes out clean or with a few dry crumbs, you're set.  

Ready, set, bake. 

Salted Caramel Cupcakes

http://www.sprinklebakes.com/2010/05/triple-salted-caramel-cupcakes.html

Batter
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour 
1 teaspoon baking powder 
1/4 teaspoon sea salt 
1 stick of unsalted butter, at room temperature 
1 cup plus 2 tablespoons packed light brown sugar 
2 large eggs, at room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons buttermilk

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Line muffin tins with papers. Combine flour, baking powder and salt in a small bowl; set aside.

Cream butter and brown sugar on medium-high speed until pale and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating until each is incorporated.  Add vanilla.  Mix and scrape down sides of bowl as needed. Add flour mixture in three batches, alternating with two additions of buttermilk, and beating until combined after each.

Divide batter evenly among lined cups, filling each about halfway full.  Bake for about 18-25 minutes. When done, let cupcakes cool before doing anything else. 

Creaming butter and brown sugar

This batter was the nicest I've ever made. It was probably because I actually sifted the dry ingredients (combining all the dry ingredients and pouring it through a tiny sieve, and shaking the sieve as if you panning for gold as you do so, until the flour is all nice and velvety.) for the first time in my baking career. I never bothered before because I didn't think it'd make a big difference. BOY WAS I WRONG.  It actually does make a big difference. Batter has always been the easy part for me but I was nervous because I didn't want to screw it up. I don't think I did, although the buttermilk seemed sketchy. It was my first experience with buttermilk and it was thick and smelly. Do people actually drink buttermilk? Oh and halfway through, my hand mixer from the early nineties BROKE. I was like, "OMFG THE BATTER IS GOING TO BE ALL LUMPY BECAUSE I'LL HAVE TO STIR IT BY HAND!" But fortunately, my mom figured out that all you have to do now is press and hold the switch to get it working. Crisis somewhat adverted. My right arm got a nice workout. 

Lessons: 
-If you can, pre-measure and combine ingredients. You will save time, something we all need more of. 
-Sift your dry ingredients for a silky smooth batter and cake! 
-Treat elderly mixers with care because they WILL have their revenge at the most inconvenient times. Or save up for a Kitchen Aid Stand Mixer in Apple Red.  

Oven Time!

As I said before, the oven time depends on your own oven's temperature and other variables. Just keep an eye on the cupcakes and use common sense. 

Caramel Filling

1/2 cup granulated sugar
3 tablespoons salted butter cubed
1/4 cup plus 1 tablespoons heavy cream, at room temperature

Melt the sugar over medium  high heat in a large pot.  Whisk the sugar as it melts and cook until it becomes a deep amber color. Add the butter and stir it in until melted. Pour in the heavy cream (mixture will foam) and whisk until you get a smooth sauce. You may have some lumps but keep stirring until they have melted.  Remove from heat and let cool slightly.  

Cut a small round piece out of the tops of each cooled cupcake and pour in caramel.  Replace the cake piece and set cupcakes aside.

This was probably the most frustrating part of the entire recipe. The original recipe just said sugar, so I thought I'd use the brown sugar from the batter because I believed that the brown sugar would give a richer colour and flavour to the caramel. I literally stood at the stove for about 20 minutes, poking at the sugar and wondering what was taking so long. Finally, with a huff, I dumped the brown sugar in a container and restarted with white sugar. Hallelujah! 

Lessons: 

-Don't try to cook brown sugar. You will be standing at the stove for a very long time and risk becoming angry at sugar. 

-Also, don't over stir the sugar. Just let it melt on its own but keep an eye on it. Once the sugar starts to change colour, it will do so very quickly and you don't want to overcook it. It’s better to take the pot off the heat early because the sugar WILL continue to cook. 

Salted Caramel Buttercream

1/4 cup granulated sugar
2 tablespoons water
1/4 cup heavy cream
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 stick salted butter
1 stick unsalted butter
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar

In a saucepan, stir together granulated sugar and water.  Bring to a boil over medium high heat.  Cook without stirring until mixture turns a deep amber color.  Remove from heat and slowly add in cream and vanilla, stirring until very smooth.  Let caramel cool for about 20 minutes, until it is just barely warm and still pourable.

In a mixer fitted with paddle attachment, beat butter and salt together until lightened and fluffy.  Reduce speed to low and add powdered sugar.  Mix until thoroughly combined.

Scrape down the side of the bowl and add the caramel.  Beat on medium high speed until light and airy, and completely mixed (about 2 minutes).  Mixture should be ready to use without refrigeration.  If your caramel was too hot when added, it will cause your icing to be runny.  If this happens refrigerate for 15-20 minutes. 

Top caramel-filled cupcakes with frosting.

The buttercream was doomed from the start. I had some leftover caramel filling so I thought, "Since the buttercream calls for more caramel, I might as well not waste this." That was a really bad decision. Also, you'll notice that the recipe calls for one stick of salted butter and one stick of unsalted  butter. Do you really expect me to buy two different kind of butter? BUTTER IS EXPENSIVE! With that rationality, I just bought unsalted butter and figured that I'd just add some salt to compensate for the salted version. No beuno. I The caramel filling combined with the buttercream recipe contained too much salt. In the morning, I had people taste-test a few cupcakes before I give them out en mass. THE BUTTERCREAM WAS TOO SALTY!!!The buttercream actually tasted fine when I was piping it but I think that for the time it sat in the fridge, the salt just infused everything...like when you pickle meat.

Lesson: 
-Don't be frugal and follow the recipe exactly. This applies especially for buttercream because you don't want to OVER SALT IT!!!  


Piping

I found a piping set at the dollar store but it was two dollars. My first thought was. "Great, I won't have to spend whatever nice piping bags cost (probably more than two dollars)." My thought when I started piping was, "DAMN THE DOLLAR STORE!" Let me explain. A piping bag has three main parts; the bag, the coupler, and the tip. 

The bag is where you put the frosting in.

The tip is where the frosting comes out in a nice pattern.

The coupler is the part that connects the bag to the tip.

I did not have a coupler. *screams* I should have just gone with using a ziplock bag...

I made it work although I had to sacrafice the nice swirls I would have gotten with  a coupler.

Lesson: 
-Just use a zip lock bag. Or even forgo the piping bag all together and just use your fingers.

Sugar

1 1/4 cups granulated sugar 
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
3/4 cup water
2-4 tablespoons of large-crystal sugar

Lay out a large piece of parchment on your work surface and spray with cooking oil (such as canola). Fill a large tub (or your sink) partially full of ice water.

Put sugar, salt and cold water in a heavy pan; stir over low heat until sugar dissolves.  Increase heat and bring syrup to a boil.  Lower heat slightly and swirl the pan once or twice as the syrup caramelizes so it will color evenly; do not stir.  Once the sugar is done, take it off the heat and design away! 

The making of this sugar went well because well... you're just melting sugar. I used a spoon in an attempt to create intricate webs of spun sugar but that didn't work out, so I ended up pouring the sugar into the pan, creating a thin layer. You'll notice that the recipe says to spray the parchment paper with cooking oil. I didn't and I had a minor heart attack when I thought that the sugar wouldn't lift. Running to the fridge, I tentatively lifted a corner and fortunately, the sugar didn't stick. I don't think that the cooking oil is necessary but you've already done all this work - might as well air on the side of precaution. By the time I got to this it was late in the evening and I was tired. If you are too impatient like I was, just stick the sugar in the fridge and it'll harden right up. After that I started to crack the sugar  up with my hands to create shard-like pieces.

Lesson:
-Read up on how to create lovely decorations with sugar before you melt the sugar. 

In conclusion, other than the salty buttercream and the wrong sized pan/liner, this first attempt wasn't bad. Not too bad at all.  

Happy Baking! 

All photos, except for 3 were taken by me with a Canon Powershot A530, first edited on Windows Live Picture Editor and then on http://pixlr.com/o-matic/. The other 3 were taken and edited by the lovely Whitney Van.