Whip It Good

These are delicious. Anything made from whipped cream is.

I made a cake a couple weeks ago and it had a caramel whipped topping. The next morning I took the whipped cream off of a cupcake and put it in my coffee. Caramel flavored whipped cream in coffee on a Sunday morning? Yes please.

Then I thought, why not have flavored whipped cream dollops in my freezer at all times? I can add them to coffee or hot chocolate, or just eat them. So that’s what I did. I made 50 little frozen bite sized whipped dollops with four different flavors. This is how I did it.

Easy Scale: 1.5. The nicer you want them to look, the more work it will take. Mine are average on the nice-looking scale. I would love to see pictures when you make yours.

Tools:

The first picture is of some options for flavoring. I used vanilla, caramel, peppermint, cinnamon and cocoa powder. Red food coloring, too.

The second picture is what you need to make the whipped cream. One recipe says 1 cup of heavy whipping cream with 1 tablespoon of confectioners sugar and 1 teaspoon of vanilla. I doubled the recipe and ended up with about 5 tablespoons of powdered sugar.

Freeze the bowl you’ll be whipping in, whip the cream (with something electric is easiest), then add the powdered sugar and vanilla. Those you can add to taste. The texture of the whipped cream should be solid enough that it stays on the spoon. In this picture we’re almost there, not quite. One recipe says, “you should see soft peaks” but I didn’t like that. It reminded me of Song of Solomon.

When you’ve whipped it good, put most of the whipped cream in a piping bag (again, use a Ziploc with a cut corner if you want to) and pipe out dollops onto a cookie sheet with wax paper. I used tip #32.

I then sprinkled these with either 1) caramel 2) cocoa powder or 3) cinnamon.

I immediately put them into the freezer so they would hold their shape.

I took the remaining whipped cream and added peppermint extract to taste. I put that whipped cream in the same piping bag and piped out more dollops onto cookie sheets with wax paper.

To make them prettier and help to give people the idea that they are peppermint flavored, I dipped a toothpick into red food coloring and drew some stripes.

Again, immediately into the freezer.

After a half hour or so they are pretty solid and you can combine them all into one storage container. They melt really quickly!

Here are some pictures of all of them together. And one of my hot chocolate with a peppermint dollop. You have to sample . . .

 

Have fun! I would love to hear your comments/suggestions for flavors or storage for gifts.

Mini Mummy Making

I originally saw these little mummies somewhere . . . probably on a magazine at a Target check out aisle. I can’t remember where it was but I do know they were not my idea. I just made a batch and now I’m telling you about it so you can do the same.

Easy Scale: 1. Very few ingredients and tools are needed.

Cake.

Secret: I use boxed cake mixes. My mom taught me that. She is a fantastic baker, yet she uses a box. She must think it’s worth it. They are so easy and delicious, why start from scratch? Betty makes things easier.

Here is what you need for the cake (or you can make it from scratch and it will probably be even more delicious). I made a white cake and added some almond flavor to it. Why is the mayonnaise there? My mom taught me to use a box, but she also taught me to add a scoop of mayo to the mix to make it better.

After mixing the batter I filled a mini muffin tin. Each cupcake is 2/3 full. i used a small spoon and an ice cream scoop to fill. They work well together.

Bake as long as the box says. When they get close you can tap the top of a cupcake and see how firm it is. If it bounces back, take them out of the oven and get them out of the pan so they stop baking. Try not to open the oven door when you are baking cakes- they could drop.

Frosting.

My mom also taught me to love almond flavoring. That’s why I add about 5 times as much almond as the recipe calls for. You can find any butter cream frosting recipe and add almond flavor instead of vanilla. My favorite frosting recipe is this. Or you can make a vanilla frosting. That’s good, too. I wanted the mummies to taste like wedding cake. It’s the best kind of cake.

Frosting should be thick enough so it sticks to a spoon, but thin enough to spread or pipe.

This is the tip you use. It has teeth on one side and is straight on the other. It’s #47 and can be purchased in a pack of two tips. You don’t have to buy a whole set of them.

A trick I learned from a chef making gnocchi in a piping bag was to spin the bag around. It moves the contents to the tip side and removes air bubbles. No piping bag? Use a gallon Ziploc with a corner cut.

Then you need some eyes (this project just got cute).

When the cupcakes are cooled you can start frosting. Put they eyes on first; you can sort of lock them in with the frosting. Add on the mummy wraps one by one.

By the time I was done I had a set pattern and stuck with it. The first 30 were practice. I am not an artist!

Here is my display for the cupcake competition at work. I ran out of eyes so I had to use sprinkles on some. The little mummies won “Best Appearance” and a $10 gift card to Jewel!

There you go! Great for cupcakes or cookies. Happy Halloween!