celebration cupcakes
People always ask me: do you prefer to cook or do you prefer to bake?
For a long time, my answer was that I preferred baking. I mean, who among us doesn’t treasure the ability to solve a sweet tooth with a creation of your own making? But over the past few years, the answer’s changed. Something about the ability to get in the kitchen and feel like you’re purely creating, rather than follow a strict recipe that’s more of a science, seemed to appeal.
It’s weird, the things you miss about people once they leave. The chance to share playfulness in the kitchen, experiments with ingredients, is one of the things that makes me the saddest. For a brief moment in time, I didn’t want to cook, because even the act of slicing ingredients made me really sad. That obviously didn’t last very long… but it was an acute pain while it lasted.
Instead, though, I’ve begun to lean into the idea of standing in the kitchen and preparing food for those you love as a celebration of sorts. A celebration of life, of love and of togetherness. Unfortunately, we learn over and over again in life that it’s the small moments - the walks to the corner store, the drives to get gas, the unremarkable Wednesday night dinners, the preparing of a meal for someone you love - it’s the small moments that we take for granted that should be anything but. Did you know the small moments are the big moments?
As I continue on this journey of processing and framing this great loss, knowing that there will only be more to come as life progresses, it’s the idea of turning moments in the kitchen into a celebration that help me smile.
And you know what celebration calls for? Baked goods. Even if they’re not your favorite thing to make!
These cupcakes were originally for a New Year’s Eve gathering with friends, a deliciously sweet way to cap the evening, and decorated to look somewhat (a little bit) like a disco ball. Because what does NYE call for if not disco balls?!
Feel free to make them for any moment or gathering (even the unremarkable Wednesday nights) and decorate them however you wish. Look at that… it’s baking, getting creative.
PUMPKIN CUPCAKES WITH CHAI BUTTERCREAM
For the cupcakes:
2 ½ cups all-purpose flour
2 cups granulated sugar
½ tsp cinnamon
½ tsp cloves
½ tsp ground ginger
½ tsp allspice
½ tsp salt
2 tsp baking soda
½ cup canola oil
1 can pumpkin puree
2 eggs
Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line a cupcake tin with cupcake holders.
Combine dry ingredients. Combine wet ingredients in a separate bowl. Add wet to dry and mix until thoroughly combined.
Fill each cupcake to 3/4 full. Bake for 20 minutes, or until a fork comes out clean. Let cool before frosting.
For the buttercream:
2 sticks room temperature butter
4 cups powdered sugar
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground cardamom
1/4 tsp allspice
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 tablespoons milk
Beat the butter on high speed until soft and creamy. Turn the mixer to low, and slowly add in the sugar, a cup at a time. Beat until the sugar is incorporated. Add the spices and vanilla, and combine. Add the milk, slowly, until frosting is at desire consistency.
A note on decorating the cupcakes:
Feel free to decorate with frosting however you like. I don’t bake enough to have a fancy frosting kit, so when I want to frost cupcakes, I use a good old-fashioned Ziploc bag, snip the end of a corner off, use a mason jar to fill it (you can see in the photos above) and you have a makeshift pastry bag! Not perfect, but kind of rustic and cute. Or at least that’s what I tell myself.
