Batter-Splattered

Margarita Chiffon Cupcakes with Strawberry Compote

I enthusiastically jumped in when I heard Laurie at the blog Quirky Cupcake was hosting a monthly cupcake event. The assignment for September? Make a cupcake with lime in the frosting, cake, filling, or all of the above.

Sounded sweet and tart -- right up my alley.

I searched through recipes for limey cakes to eventually turn into cupcakes and found this one for a Margarita Chiffon Cake with Strawberry Compote. I hesitated, a bit worried someone else would use the same recipe. Why wouldn't they, after all? Not only is there cake involved but there's also tequila, lime juice, and triple sec. The temptation was too great. I couldn't bear to continue searching. I'd found my recipe... and a little something to sip while baking:

I'm such a cheap date.

This recipe is for a chiffon cake. Epicurious' intro mentions a bit of the history surrounding chiffon cakes and I was intrigued: created in 1927 by the appropriately-named Harry Baker from California... insurance salesman and part-time caterer... he wouldn't tell a soul how to bake it for 20 years... in 1948, he finally sold the recipe to Betty Crocker (according to wikipedia -- epicurious says General Mills) who called it 'the cake discovery of the century'... vegetable oil was the secret ingredient, making the cake moist, light, and rich.

I think five egg yolks and 8 beaten egg whites have a little something to do with it too!

The cake, the glaze, and the strawberry compote are all swimming in margarita makings. Makes my mouth water just thinking about it.

You know how sometimes you're in the middle of working on a recipe and there's a moment when you know it's going to be really, really good even though you're nowhere near the finish line? This was one of those recipes. I think it was the lovely smell -- the tequila, the sugars, and all that fresh lime juice. So lovely. And the results? Even lovelier:

The ooey-gooey glaze drips down onto the plate and mixes it up the margarita sauce from the berries. The cupcake is the perfect thing to sop up it all up. Mmm. Mmm. Mmm.

Margarita Chiffon Cupcakes with Strawberry Compote

Makes about 24 cupcakes

Cake ingredients:

2 1/4 c cake flour

1 1/4 c sugar, divided

1 T baking powder

1 t salt

6 large egg yolks

1/2 c vegetable oil

1/3 c fresh lime juice (altogether, you need about 4 limes to make the cupcakes and compote -- zest all of the limes before juicing)

1/3 c triple sec

2 T tequila

2 t grated lime peel

8 large egg whites

1/2 t cream of tartar

Glaze ingredients:

2 T fresh lime juice

2 T tequila

4 t triple sec

1 /2 t grated lime peel

2 c powdered sugar

Compote ingredients:

6 T triple sec

1/3 c fresh lime juice

3 1/2 T tequila

2 T zested lime peel

1/3 c sugar

5 c strawberries, hulled and sliced

For cake:

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Whisk flour, 3/4 c sugar (save the remaining half cup for later), baking powder, and salt in a large bowl to blend. Beat egg yolks and next 5 ingredients in a medium bowl to blend. Add to the dry ingredients and beat just until smooth.

Using clean beaters, beat egg whites and cream of tartar in another large bowl or mixer until soft peaks form. Gradually add the remaining 1/2 cup of sugar, beating until stiff peaks form (but don't let the whites get too dry). Fold 1/3 of the egg whites into the batter, then fold in the remaining whites.

Line muffin pans with paper cups and fill with batter almost to the tops of the paper cups. Bake until tester inserted near the center comes out clean -- watch them carefully. Mine only took 10 - 15 mintues to bake. Cool on wire racks in muffin pans.

For compote:

Whisk together the first four ingredients and then stir in sugar until combined. Add strawberries and toss. Let stand at room temperature for one hour or chill up to 4 hours.

For glaze:

Stir first four ingredients in a medium bowl then whisk in powdered sugar until combined. Spread over top of cooled cupcakes and allow glaze to drip down sides.

your granola bar won't cure the anthrax

What happens when a five-story office building full of government workers receives a venomous letter full of white powder (it was all so 2001) and no one's allowed to leave or enter for five hours on Friday afternoon while the men in rubber suits and respirators determine our fate and rabid reporters swim shark-like in the streets waiting for us to cough up blood, pressing their business cards up against the glass and mouthing the words CALL ME...

One word for you: CIRCUS.

Our thoughts turned immediately to food. What would we eat? How soon till we began to wither? It was lunchtime, after all. We're all about our stomachs at that office. We have a snack table on which nothing but snacks may be placed. We call it The Magic Table because lovely food just miraculously appears on it. No lunch? Sweet jumpin' jehosephat. Could we bear up under such conditions?

Flashback to a couple of weeks ago when a co-worker had the brilliant idea of creating a healthy snack box for the office. She was tired of paying way too much for the crap in the vending machine so she tromped off to Costco and stocked up on granola bars, nuts, popcorn, veggie chips, etc, etc, etc. Then she sent off an email to everyone on our floor telling them the snacks were ours for the taking if we were willing to shell out 50 cents per snack. $1 for Power bars.

People were mildly interested in the healthy snack box. They would poke around in there and ask how much profit was being made. Yes, yes, that' right -- she's financing her retirement and/or heroin habit off kettle corn. They would say things like, "I don't know... a dollar for a Power Bar? Pretty sure I could get it for less by bringing my own..." Spend enough time around attorneys and most will eventually tell you that they have no money. They're broke. Penniless.

Well. No. You have money, or should I say you had money. You just spent it all. That's not the same as being poor. There's a big difference, counselor.

Like I said, people were mildly interested in the snack box. Mildly, that is, until we got locked up right before lunch time and were told we could be there for quite some time. A bitter pill to swallow considering I had lunch plans at F Street Station and thought I'd be sinking my teeth into a great big juicy burger. That giant block of cheese they keep on the bar was sounding better and better.

No sooner had the authorities shut down the ventilation system than people began diving towards the snack box, dollar bills clenched in their fists, setting off a mad, panicky, buying spree, with people worrying aloud that they might not be able to buy enough 100-calorie packs before the price gouging went into effect.

Suppy and demand, people. Suppy and demand.

I could steer clear of the snack box. There was no mad snack-buying on my part because if you were to check the top drawer of that file cabinet in the corner of my office? It ain't full of files. Soup. Granola bars. Cereal. Oatmeal. Galore.

I didn't volunteer that information to anyone else, of course. I always knew one day I'd get trapped in that building (we're in earthquake territory) and by God, I was gonna be ready.

I spent my time emailing my brother to tell him if anything should happen to me I wanted all my money to go to Jesus (I need to make up for lost time) and I kept my nose pressed against my window (which had a stellar view of all the action down in the street), calling out updates to co-workers busy cramming roasted almonds into their mouths ... the men in black had just arrived... the haz mat people just pulled out a inflatable, cartoon-covered, rubber kiddie pool. What were they going to do with that?... one co-worker was down on the street sassing a cop -- complete with finger-jabbing to drive home her point -- because she wanted back inside...

Five hours later we were all released after thorough testing of the powder revealed no spores. The healthy snack box co-worker and I dodged reporters on our way out the door, sucked in the cool fresh autumn air, and drove straight to McDonalds for french fries and a diet coke to celebrate our sweet, sweet freedom.

Whole wheat bread

I may never buy a $5 loaf of bread again.

Don't get me wrong. I don't spend that much on every loaf of bread I buy -- not for sandwich bread, for instance. Any old loaf of whole wheat or pumpernickel or sourdough is fine for sandwiches because there's so many layers of things in between to distract me from focusing too much on the bread.

But I'm a toast person. A good breakfast for me is a cup of coffee and a couple of pieces of toast slathered with jelly or jam or butter or peanut butter. You have to have good bread if you're having toast. Something to really sink your teeth into. My search for a loaf of good-quality whole wheat bread free of high fructose corn syrup always seems to end up costing me around-abouts $5. I bring it home and hide it from my husband so he doesn't inhale it without appreciation -- all bread's the same to him and if he did the shopping we'd have a bread basket full of Wonder bread.

I'll pause here to shudder.

Considering the fact that I just paid $4.33 for a gallon of milk, $5 is just too much to pay for bread and that's why I was so excited to find this recipe which yielded two beautiful loaves of scrumptious whole wheat bread. And it's not one of those lame recipes that say 'whole wheat' in the title, only to skim through the ingredients and find out they want you to use half whole wheat flour and half all-purpose.

Not too heavy or yeast-y the way that some homemade whole wheat is.

Not too dry.

No corn syrup.

It makes REALLY good toast.

Kneading bread dough always reminds me of my grandfather (my mother's father) who died before I was born. Kids loved him. He loved to make bread. He'd make his five daughters laugh and squeal with riotous disgust by telling them the reason he liked kneading bread so much was that it got all the dirt and grease out from under his fingernails (he was a mechanic).

I would tell you that my fingernails were mighty clean after baking this bread, but I won't, because I shared a few slices with people who read this blog and I wouldn't want to make them squeal. I think that sort of thing really only appeals to small children. And mechanics.

Here's to you, Grandpa.

Whole Wheat Bread Hayes

Makes 2 loaves

2 c warm water (105 - 115 degrees)

1/4 ounce packet (2 1/2 t) active dry yeast

1/4 c molasses

5 - 6 cups whole-wheat flour

2 T sugar

1 t salt

1/2 c canola oil

1 egg white beaten with 1 t water to make an egg wash

3 T old-fashioned rolled oats for sprinkling

In a small bowl, stir together 1 3/4 c warm water and the yeast. Let stand until foamy, about 5 minutes. In another small bowl, whisk together remaining 1/4 c warm water and molasses. In a large bowl, stir together 2 cups flour, sugar, salt, and oil. Add molasses and yeast mixtures, stirring until combined will. Stir in enough of the remaining 3 - 4 cups of flour, half a cup at a time, until mixture forms a soft dough.

Turn out onto a lightly floured surface. Knead for 8 minutes or so, until smooth and elastic. Shape into a ball and place in a lightly oiled bowl, turning to coat. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise in a warm place until doubled in bulk, about 1 hour.

Punch down dough and let rise, covered, for 45 more minutes.

Grease 2 loaf pans (8.5 x 4.5) and divide dough in half. Lightly knead each piece of dough and form into ovals. Place in pans and cover with kitchen towels. Let rise for 45 minutes.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Prepare egg wash and brush it lightly onto the tops of the loaves. Sprinkle with oats. Bake in middle of oven for 10 minutes then reduce oven temperature to 350 degrees. Bake loaves 20-25 minutes more, or until golden brown.

Turn out onto a rack to cool. 

daily photo

tres jolie...

daily photo

Super-sized...

...and so pretty.

daily photo

Carnations -- not the hippest flower out there but they sure look pretty on the dining room table, they smell like spring, and they last forever!