This week’s cupcakes have a bit of a story with them. The earth quake and tsunami that happened in Japan recently is a real tragedy. A few of my colleagues are Japanese and one of them has baked everyday last week. She baked simple cookies to traditional Japanese dessert. She brought her baked goods into the studio to collected donations for her to give directly to the Japanese Red Cross. I offered up this week’s cupcakes to help her collect more donations. (You can also donate online on the Red Cross website.) I tried to find an appropriate flavour and went with white chocolate and matcha green tea with fondant decorations on top. Here is the recipe for 18 cupcakes:

cake:
-100g of white chocolate
- 1/3 cup of milk
- 1/3 cup of cream
- 3/4 cup of butter
- 1 1/4 cup sugar
- 2 eggs
- 1/4 tsp of almond extract
- 2 cups of flour
- 2 tsp of baking powder
- pinch of salt
- 1/3 cup of cream
- 1/3 cup of milk

method:
- put the white chocolate in a bowl
- bring the milk and cream to a boil and pour over the chocolate
- let sit for 5 minutes and whisk together
- preheat the oven to 350
- beat the butter until it is light and fluffy
- add the sugar and beat thoroughly
- add the eggs one at a time and beat in between each addition, then beat on high for 30 seconds
- sift the flour, baking powder and salt together and combine with the butter/sugar mix
- add the chocolate and combine
- add the cream and milk and combine until smooth
- line a cupcake pan with paper cups
- bake for 20 minutes

icing:
- 3 egg whites
- 165g of sugar
- 1 1/4 cup of butter cut in 1 inch cubes
- 1 tbs + 1 tsp of matcha green tea

method:
- combine the egg whites and sugar in a double boiler
- whisk a little until all the sugar is melted away
- take off the double boiler and beat on high until cooled and turned into a firm meringue, touch the bottom of the bowl to make sure its at least body temperature
- add the butter one cube at a time while beating on a lower speed
- beat on high until you get a nice fluffy texture (it will turn to a cottage cheese kind of texture about half way through, just keep beating)
- add the matcha

Enjoy!

Categories: Chocolate, other sweet flavors | 5 Comments »