Yes, I do plan to continue with my Pinterest Challenge posts throughout 2012. I may not get one up every week even though that is my goal. Some weeks may be posts about ideas that I just want to share but may not have time to do - but really, I want them to be things I've tried and either succeeded at or failed at so that maybe I can save you some work (or give you some inspiration!)
This weeks Challenge is a recipe. I needed to pick a dessert to have for New Years Eve so I decided to search through my
Recipe Board and find something that looked good. My husband is a huge fan of Carrot Cake so when I saw this recipe for
Inside-Out-Carrot Cake Cupcakes, I knew it was the perfect fit PLUS, I would be able to send them in his lunch, assuming they were good!
Inside-out-Carrot Cake Cupcakes
adapted from King Arthur Flour
I was pretty impressed with this recipe. I obviously must have put too much batter in the muffin cups because I did not have any batter left (the recipe says you will not use all of the batter). I will experiment a little more with the cheesecake filling - my husband said it needs to be sweeter and there needs to be more of it - I would have to agree. I think if I did that, instead of 12 cupcakes, I could get 18 cupcakes.
Filling
- one 8-ounce package cream cheese or Neufchâtel cheese
- 1/4 cup granulated sugar
Muffins
- 2 1/4 cups King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour
- 1/2 cup granulated sugar
- ¼ cup light brown sugar, firmly packed
- 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
- ¼ teaspoon baking soda
- 1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
- 3/4 teaspoon ground ginger
- 3/4 teaspoon salt
- 2 large eggs
- 3/4 cup water
- 1/3 cup vegetable oil
- 1 cup grated carrots, lightly packed; about 2 medium-large carrots
Directions
| 1) Preheat the oven to 400°F. Lightly grease a standard 12-well muffin pan. Or line the pan with paper muffin cups, and grease the cups. |
| 2) To make the filling: Place the cream cheese in a microwave-safe bowl, and heat on low power for 40 seconds. Stir in the sugar. Set aside. |
| 3) To make the muffin batter: In a medium-sized bowl, whisk together the dry ingredients. |
| 4) In a small bowl, whisk together the eggs, water, and oil. |
| 5) Stir the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients. |
| 6) Fold in the grated carrots, stirring to combine. |
| 7) Drop about 2 tablespoons of the batter (a tablespoon cookie scoop works well here) into each muffin cup, spreading it to cover the bottom. |
| 8) Dollop on a heaping tablespoon of filling; a level tablespoon cookie scoop works well here. |
| 9) Cover with enough batter to fill the muffin cups quite full. The batter will come to within about 1/4" to 3/8" of the top of each muffin cup. But don't try to use all the batter; unless you have particularly deep cups, you'll have abut 1/3 cup batter left over. Bake it in a separate custard cup, if desired. |
| 10) Bake the muffins until a toothpick inserted into the cake part of one (not into the cream cheese filling) comes out clean, about 20 minutes. The tops of the muffins will feel firm to the touch. |
| 11) Remove the muffins from the oven, and as soon as you're able to handle them, transfer them to a rack. If you serve the muffins warm, the filling will be molten. If you wait for them to cool, it'll firm up. |
| Yield: 12 filled muffins plus 1 unfilled muffin. |
If you try this recipe and like it, let me know!
