Mini Apple Pies and other stuff

While in New York my husband went on a quest to find me a cupcake shirt. He had hoped to find an "I cupcake NY" tee, but after seeking out all three shops he only found one adult sized shirt. It's and XL, but I still love it to pieces! It speaks the truth.

Now for the apples and the pie. I left behind the graffiti and bums of Oakland for a day and visited lovely Apple Hill with some pals. It's been a yearly sojourn for my friend and her family for quite some time, and it was my second year of stowing away in her car and joining the fun. It was a perfect day to start fall off with a kick. The skies dark grayfulfilled their promise of rain (seriously, I love the rain) and the fall colours were really starting to put on a show. Huddling under and unbrella and drinking hot cider while kids frolic in a pumpkin patch is about as good as it gets for getting in the autumn mood. We didn't pick any of our own apples this year, but I did buy a half bushel of Granny Smiths. For some wild and crazy reason, I decided I needed to learn to can my own foods.
The next week saw me pouring over books on canning and staring in some confusion at strange new tools at the store. After many hours of labor I ended up with bunch of new gadgets, a stack of apple filled jars, and a very sticky kitchen. I'd say it was a success. I only broke one jar, and it seems like most of my seals took. Those that didn't were of course sacririced to taste testing. I mean, I better make sure it's good before I give in out right? (it was awesome over yogurt for breakfast. I might need to test another jar...)

I'm still using up the apples, so tonight I made a few mini pies for my husband and I. The itsy bitsy apples next to the pie weren't used, but I saw them at work the other day and couldn't resist them. I mean seriously? Who thought fruit could get that cute? I should have put something in the photo for size reference. But the little apple in the front isn't much bigger around than a quarter.

Apple Pie for Three
Makes enough for three cupcake sized pies

Crust

5T frozen butter
1/2c +2T all purpose flour
1T sugar
3-4T ice water

Sift together flour and sugar. Grate frozen butter into the flour mixture (if your kitchen is warm, sticking the grater in the freezer for a few minutes can help keep things neat). Toss mixutre to break up any clups of butter. Sprinkly water over the flour and toss with a fork until it is somewhat evenly distributed. Kneed a time or two to get the dough to stick together, but no more than you have to. Wrap in plastic and chill for about half an hour (not super critical, but it makes the dough easier to work with)
Roll dough out on floured surface. Use a flattened out cupcake liner as a guide for cutting the dough. You'll want it to be slightly larger than the liner so the it comes out of the cup enough to attach the top crust. Fill with as much apple as you can, and top with more pie crust.
Brush with egg wash and bake at 425 degrees until golden.

Filling

2 medium/large green apples
1T lemon juice
1/2t lemon zest
dash salt
1/4c brown sugar (I don't like my pie too sweet, so it was a loose measure. You can pack the sugar if you like it sweeter)
dash nutmeg/cinnamon/cloves/ginger
1t flour

Peel core and chop the apples. Sprinkle with lemon juice and toss to coat. Mix all other ingredients and add to apples.

Pumpkiny Shaped Little Cakes

Well these were taken in a poorly lit kitchen with my little camera that refuses to focus on close up things, but anyways... I was proud of how they came out. We've been selling them in the store for a week or so now, when I stumbled across a Woman's Day magazine in the break room. I was so crestfallen when I saw an incredibly similar cupcake on the cover. My soul cringes at the thought that someone may think I got my ideas from there. Sigh.
Anyways, I'm taking a little break from working on a painting while my masking fluid dries. So I thought I'd post these little guys.
Enjoy!

Jalapeno Cupcake

The little guy in the back is a lemon. Made for my friend who doesn't
care for jalapenos. The sprinkles around the side of the jalapeno one
up front got the added kick of a little chili powder.

That's right baby, I'm bringing the heat! So I initially messed around with a jalapeno cupcake for the Cupcake Hero but I never got around to submitting them. Largely I'll admit because my photos of round one were less than riveting. That time I added blueberries to the cake and topped them with a very unplanned slapdash blueberry cream cheese mousse concoction. It tasted pretty decent, but I didn't take any great amount of pride in it. The next two times I made these spicy babies I just added them to my vanilla recipe then topped them with cream cheese frosting. I can assure you, take some of these bad boys out with you and you'll become the center of attention.
Oh, and sorry I missed the Daring Bakers challenge. Not only have I been crazy busy, but since my husband was out of town the for the last half of the month it was hard to motivate myself to bake. It would just sit there, taunting me, telling me to eat it all or else it would go to waste. And who wants that kind of pressure from a cracker?

Candied Jalapeno

4 Jalapeño Peppers, cut into rings
1 cup granulated sugar
1 cups water

In a saucepan, add sugar and water. Heat over low heat until the mixture forms a syrup. Add jalapeno slices and heat 3-4 minutes. Remove the jalapenos and allow to cool. Repeat by adding the pepper slices to the syrup until the jalapeno peppers are thickly candied.

I used most of the candied jalapenos in the cake, then tosses a few in the frosting. It gave them just the right kick to me, but you can adjust according to your taste, and to the size of your peppers (mine were not terribly large)

Cake

1/4 lb butter (not rock hard, not mushy. Just a little soft)
1 cup sugar
2 eggs (room temp)
1/2 cup milk (room temp)
1 1/2 cup cake flour
1/2 and 1/4 tsp baking powder
candied jalapenos

Cream butter and sugar until extremely light and fluffy. Seriously. When you think it might be light enough, scrap down the bowl and cream it some more. Just cream the living daylights out of it. Got it? Maybe you should cream it some more. (if your kitchen is hot and you start to get a soupy mix, pop it in the fridge for a bit)
Add eggs a little at a time on medium speed. Allow to mix 20 seconds or so after each addition. Scrape down bowl and mix 20 seconds more. If it looks curdled, you added the eggs too quickly (tut tut). It won't make a big difference in the end, they just won't be quite so domed.
Sift together dry ingredients. (well, really you should have done this back while the butter and sugar were taking their sweet time getting all creamified and fluffy). Add one third of the dry and mix on low. Add one half of the milk and continue mixing. Repeat, finish with the last bit of flour. Once flour is mixed in, scrape down bowl and mix again on medium speed for about ten seconds (if you are using regular flour you'll want to handle the batter a little bit more delicately, maybe just mix for one mississippi). Fold in jalapenos. Bake at 350 until slightly golden and springy (no, I don't know how long it takes. I generally don't time them, I just poke my head in when it seems like enough time has elapsed. So you'll just have to figure that part out on your own)
Tada! You have cakes.

Frosting

I can't find anywhere that I've written it down. I may have just been making it from memory. Or it could be on one of the bank stubs and junk mail envelopes pilled up in my cabinet. I tend to write my recipes on these things. And my recipes tend to be comprised of just a list on ingredients. No title, no directions. It can get a little confusing. So for now, how's about you just use your favorite super cheesey frosting and toss some jalapenos in it? Heck, just whipped cream cheese might work!