Peanut Butter and Jelly Cupcakes

For my husband's bowling league, I was asked to make Peanut Butter & Jelly cupcakes. I have made these once before, however my husband asked that I don't do the glaze, but instead frost it with frosting. I decided to do a peanut butter and jelly swirl frosting. I was picturing the frosting being brighter and more vibrant, but I think they look great! My husband asks that next time I add more peanut butter to the batter, as he could barely taste it. Instead of adding the jelly to the unbaked batter, I cooked the peanut butter batter by itself. Then I cored the cupcakes and stuffed the hole with jelly, using 1/2-3/4 C strawberry jelly overall. I put the jelly in a pastry bag and squeezed the jelly into the holes. It was a lot less messy that way! Then I topped the cupcakes with the frosting. The original cupcake recipe can be found here. The two different frostings were easy, based off my original frosting recipe. Some of the guys at the bowling alley changed their favorite cupcake from Pumpkin Ginger to this one! I was very surprised!!

This is the cute box!

I met some new people over the weekend at a Halloween party. One of whom, Hilary, was so intrigued by my cupcakes that she said she would stop by the bowling alley on Thursday to try some of my cupcakes and get some business cards. Silly me, at the Halloween party, I didn't have any business cards! I packaged up some cupcakes in a cute box for Hilary and topped it with some business cards. At the party, she had said she knows people who would probably order from me!

Here you can see the jelly filled center.

These are the cored, unfilled cupcakes!

These are the cores from the Peanut Butter Cupcakes!

These are the cored and jelly filled cupcakes!

Black Russian Cupcakes with Kahlua Frosting

One of the bowlers from a different team in my husband's league asked if I could make a dozen cupcakes for his birthday. He said he would pay for them, of course. I asked what he would like, and he said to surprise him. He had given me a short list of some of his favorite flavors a week prior, so I set to work and find a recipe that would work with what he likes. I found a Black Russian cupcake recipe here, and changed just a few things. The recipe was rather easy, and depending on how it tastes, may become a fan favorite. Since this recipe makes 2 dozen cupcakes, I cut everything in half. When I have an order from customers, I buy a cake box to put them in so that the customer can take the cupcakes home. I decided to get creative and cut four little slits in the top of the box to hold my business card! I think it looks great, and a great way of branding my cupcakes!

* I do not own a coffee pot or coffee grounds, so I use instant coffee for my baking recipes. For the frosting, I do not use 3 tbsp coffee, but instead mixed the Kahlua with 1 1/2-2 tsp instant coffee and disolve as much of the instant coffee as you can. This method will get the coffee flavor without making the frosting too liquid.

Deep Chocolate Cupcakes - Shipped!

I had a lot of Raspberry Frosting left over, so I decided to try to ship cupcakes to my family back in California. I made a dozen Deep Chocolate Cupcakes without wrappers. When the cupcakes were cooled, I cut them in half horizontally and layered the cupcake halves and frosting in a tall Mason Jar. I looked up shipping costs and UPS, FedEx, and DHL were all way too expensive. I went with USPS for $10.50: 2-3 day Priority Mail. I shipped the cupcakes on Saturday, my mom received them on Monday. The cupcakes needed to be refrigerated once received, just to solidify the frosting again. I sent a total of 6 jars to my mom, and she gave some to my sister and my mother-in-law. Everyone was really excited to get some of my cupcakes since they haven't had them in 4 months. The cupcakes were very moist, but the frosting was rather tart. I assume that the raspberries got sweeter and sweeter the longer they stayed in the frosting. The layers stayed together, no major shifting. I will definitely be doing this again in the future! I might even use smaller Mason Jars for individual cupcakes, since the tall jars hold 2 cupcakes each.

On Sunday, I had an order for a dozen Red Velvet cupcakes. Such a great recipe and a very photogenic cupcake!