Veggie Goodness. Carrot Cupcakes

A carrot cupcake should have visible shreds of carrots for it to be called carrot cupcake. An orange or yellow colored cupcake is not a carrot cupcake. Do not be cheap with the carrots.

A carrot cupcake should have pineapple bits. It adds sweetness and flavor dimension.

A carrot cupcake should have raisins or prunes. Its something to look forward to... on every bite.

A carrot cupcake should have walnuts... hazelnuts are rare but thats  pure indulgence. This guys will add texture and peanut butter-jelly compliment to the carrot cupcake.

A carrot cupcake should have cinnamon and vanilla. What you will smell is what you will eat. If your house doesn't smells good while baking then I'm sure it doesn't taste delish!

A carrot cupcake should be homey and simple. 

Happy carrot cupcaking! 

Eat Meat Pies.

Im desperate to make a real empanada, but my setback is deep frying it. I love deep fried foods but Im wary of doing it myself. One, I dont have a deep fryer and two, its a waste of oil, in our house we only use canola oil, imagine wasting minimum half a liter of canola oil. Wheew! Yes its the stingy me! So I decided to do BAKED Meat Pies! It turned out to be just okay.... the crust is not flaky enough... and the filling was a little tad salty. This is where I say... TILL NEXT TIME..

Cream Puffs!

Cream Puffs are difficult to make. I'm not saying this to scare you but to challenge you to make one. They said if you can bake cream puffs then you can surely bake anything. This is the ultimate baking test that separates men from boys... The difficult part here is making it rise... because in cream puffs you don't use leavening agents nor whipped egg whites, just steam and the right oven temperature. 

Tips in making Cream Puffs:

• Pre-heat your oven well make sure it has reached 450F before baking the cream puffs.
• After putting the flour in the water-butter mixture make sure no flour lumps is left before adding the eggs.
• Let it cool slightly before adding the eggs so that the eggs wont curdle.
• Pipe cream puffs into a greased-floured baking sheet using a large round or rosette tip. 
• When your cream puffs are already inside the oven, do not be tempted to open the oven door to see the puffs. Believe me it will sink. Wait for it to be golden brown before opening. If the cream puffs are already golden brown and standing firmly, its done! Do not over-bake or else your base crust will be charred.
• Pipe the pastry cream filling or you can slice it sandwich style. Use a pointed round tip for filling. (#230 is recommended)
• Be careful with the caramelized sugar, its really painful if it drips on you. Caramelized the sugar in LOW FIRE and in a heavy bottomed frying pan. Hold the cream puff in its base, twirl/wipe it in the caramelized sugar. This process will take a lot of practice. Doing it FAST is the technique . Anyways, if you don't get burns you wont master it!

HAPPY CREAM PUFFING!

Its the Chocolate Cupcake!

I love them with Homemade Chocolate Fudge.

• 125 grams dark chocolate, broken into pieces
•  1/4 c or half stick unsalted butter
• 1 egg
• 175 icing sugar
• 1/2 t vanilla extract
• Place the chocolate and butter in a bowl over a pan of hot water and stir until melted ( Do not use double boiler, just hot water). Remove from the heat and beat in the egg with icing icing sugar and vanilla. Beat until smooth and glossy. Allow to cool and thicken for spreading consistency. * Refrigerate for piping consistency *

I love them topped with white chocolate shavings.
I love them cold.

Will always love homemade chocolate cupcakes. 

Now Open.

Pages The Mason Jar of Recipes and La Bella Vita are now officially open. Will be updating as frequently as possible. Visit 'em earthlings! Enjoy and Thank you.!

- Ms. Claudine

Finally the Perfect Butterscotch!

No exaggeration but it took me 5 recipes just to finalize the ingredients, measurements, and cooking time for the quest of the perfect butterscotch. Im sorry but I wont be sharing to you my recipe... because I think Im selling this one... but for consolation and for the purpose of subtle kindness I  shared the base recipe which was derived from a Good Housekeeping Book... please visit my Mason Jar of Recipes page. 

I have received a lot of negative feedbacks about my butterscotch before, some said its too sweet, others commented that its not that chewy or its too chewy or it has too many nuts or something is really missing.... so I read, researched, experimented and tested all feasible recipes that I can find... after a lot of recipe tweaking finally a moist, sweetness balanced, and chewy butterscotch!

If a person/s says that your goods are not that nice, prove them wrong. Never give up.