Go Ahead, Cupcake, Make my Day!

I recently had the pleasure of judging a Christmas cupcake contest on the well-known Cupcak(e)ista's blog. During the process, I met (albeit virtually) Dorian of Mais Pourquoi Est-ce Que Je Vous Raconte Ca... who organizes an annual event called Cupcakes's Day; this year, the 3rd Annual Cupcake's Day will take place on March 6.

I've never met a cupcake event I didn't love and so of course wanted to get in on the action! Especially since the French seem to be embracing my native childhood dessert with such fervor! Today I am going to share a recipe that I recently whipped up as one of my Valentine's Day selections called Wonderful Tonight. It's a light, luscious cupcake for Spring (which I am hoping is just around the corner) and combines several of my favorite flavors: cherry, almonds and chocolate.



A special shout-out to Halwati Shop, an online baking supply boutique, which I have had the pleasure of discovering a few weeks back and am already hooked! No more international ordering for me to source my supplies, Halwati has an AMAZING array of cupcake cases, cutters and moulds, color gels, glitter, and all sorts of tools for the cake and cupcake lover. I made the intricate lace heart decoration and embossed flowers you see in this post (below) with sugarpaste using a Halwati silicone mould and plunger cutter respectively. And I finished the overall presentation with some gorgeous Vestlihouse liners, also from Halwati Shop.



Wonderful Tonight
Almond cupcake with cherry jam center & chocolate buttercream

Makes 18
Almond Cupcakes:
4 ozs. unsalted butter/beurre doux, softened
1 cup sugar/sucre en poudre
1 large egg
1 tsp. baking soda/bicarbonate alimentaire
1/2 - 1 tsp. almond extract (use the greater amount if you really like almonds; I use the Vahine brand: "Arome Amande amere")
½ tsp. salt
1/2 cup slivered almonds
1 ½ cups flour
1/2 cup buttermilk /lait fermente
1/2 cup hot water

1) Pre-heat oven to 350F/180C. Grease or place cupcake liners into cupcake tins.
2) To make cupcakes, cream together sugar and butter until smooth. Add egg, almond extract, baking soda, salt and mix until well-combined.
3) Alternate adding flour and buttermilk in 3 batches, mix well until smooth. Add hot water last and mix to combine. Add in almonds and mix again.
4) Fill cupcake liners 2/3rds full.
5) Bake for 17-20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Remove cupcakes from tin and let cool on wire rack.

Cherry Jam Center:
I use a recipe from David Lebovitz because I really enjoy making my own jam. But if you want to take a shortcut, it's perfectly acceptable to substitute store-bought in this recipe.

1) Once the cupcakes have cooled, take a small sharp knife and cut an inverted cone shape out of the center of each cupcake. Be careful not to cut all the way down, you want to leave a small layer of cake at the bottom of the liner.
2) Spoon 2-3 teaspoons jam into the area you have hollowed out from the cupcake.
3) Replace cupcake top - if it's poking out too much, shave some cake off the bottom of the cone and put back in place.



Chocolate Buttercream:
300g 70% dark chocolate, melted (you can substitute white chocolate for a lighter version)
175g unsalted butter, at room temp
10 ml whipping cream
350g icing sugar, sifted

1) Cream the butter and sugar in a stand mixer until light and fluffy. Add in cream.
2) Add melted chocolate and beat until thick and creamy.
3) Frost cupcakes using a pastry tip and decorate as desired!

This Cupcake is B-A-N-A-N-A-S

B-A-N-A-N-A-S
Originally uploaded by Sugar Daze (f/k/a LittleMissCupcakeParis)

The banana brown sugar cupcake lightly spiced with fresh ginger and cinnamon and topped with a salted caramel buttercream. Available tonight & tomorrow along with C is for Cookie, I Love You Honey Bunny & I Want (Cotton) Candy cupcakes at Tan 'in Bar, 18 rue Breguet, 75011 Paris.

I See Your True Colors Shining Through

It is frigid out today in Paris, though we were lucky to have a few rays of sunshine this morning. I feel like it's time to pack it all in and go hibernate for a few months and so decided to dress up today's orders in some bright, vivid Spring colors.



Petal pink, bright lemon and rosy red add some splash to She Wore Lemon, Rogue, and Strawberry Berry Berry Good cupcakes (above); I had some fun with the piping on Strawberry ones which remind me of those old bathing caps the synchronized swimmers wore in the '50's. And then I went with lots of sparkles and pink buttercream to accent the 3-layer Vanilla Lovers Cinderella cake. Don't you just love Cinderella's dress with the feather collar? Tres chic!

Love to Love You Baby!

The Sugar Daze Valentine's Day coffret is back and better than ever (reserve yours now - quantities are limited)!

The 2011 collection includes.....

2 cupcakes of your choice in the following flavors:

Vanilla Lovers (vanilla bean cupcake & buttercream)
Rogue (vanilla bean cupcake & milk chocolate buttercream)
Wonderful Tonight (almond cupcake with a cherry-vanilla jam center & dark chocolate buttercream)
Sexy Back (vanilla cupcake, champagne macerated raspberries gelee center, & your choice of rose OR milk chocolate buttercream)
La Vie en Rose (white chocolate chunk cupcake & your choice of strawberry-rose OR raspberry buttercream)
Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (my favorite: red velvet cupcake & your choice of vanilla bean OR spicy cinnamon cream cheese frosting)

+ an adorable card for your beloved specially created for Sugar Daze by Bonne Fete (pictured). Available in tiffany blue/red or pink/red, cupid takes aim at a cupcake/inside of card is blank.


The set = 11,00 euros.

Cupcakes can be picked up on February 14 at either our Paris 75011 or 75017 locations. Send an email to info@sugardazecupcakes.com for more information or to reserve yours. Peace, love and cupcakes y'all!



Unattached? There's no reason to deprive yourself of some delicious Valentine's Day cupcakes made with love! Several decorations available including this "Love Stinks," a black rose or a declaration "I Love Me." Make sure to specify you want a "Not in the Mood for Love" box when ordering.

Just a Little Patience

If I hadn't already changed my name from Little Miss Cupcake, I would seriously start considering a change to Little Miss Cake! Since the beginning of January, it has literally been like a cake factory here in my kitchen. And I gotta tell you, I am not as comfortable with cakes as I am with cupcakes. There is a definite skill to cutting and layering cakes so that they stand up straight. And since I am not a huge fan of fondant-covered cakes, it takes a lot of patience to get a smooth surface with your buttercream. I also firmly believe that there is a real art to decorating a cake. I see that big surface staring me in the face and I don't see a canvas...I see something that I am really not quite sure what to do with!

I have been looking at a lot of different sites lately to get some inspiration as I seem to be getting more and more calls for cake. I've recently discovered Pink Cake Box, Petal Sweet Cakes and Zoe Clark among others. If you're a cake baker, feel free to leave me a note and tell me where you draw your inspiration from. I'll be sticking to cupcakes where I can but do find a certain relaxation in cake baking and making. One of my goals for the year in addition to improving my cake decorating skills is to find a cake style and stick with it. I think that will make the process easier and more enjoyable.

Fist up was a Hot Wheels cake for my son's 8th birthday. The kids at his party were fascinated by the grass and were having fits of giggles when they asked me for more grass please!

Next was a wedding cake for a couple who brought me a shawl worn by the fiance's great grandmother on the day she was married 60 or so years ago. The current fiancee would be wearing it on her wedding day as well. The design on the cake was inspired by the cascades of yellow, beige and white blossoms on that shawl.


They there was a cake for a two year-old's birthday. Her parents wanted an elephant on the cake.

And lastly a second wedding cake for a couple who were both getting married for the second time. They wanted something somewhat traditional but at the same time kind of against the grain. I ordered these absolutely exquisite blood-red roses from my florist and they really stole the show -- this was actually a pretty fairly easy cake to make but the results were extraordinary thanks to the fresh blooms.

I Will Not Eat Things for Money

I haven't seen the Simpsons in many years but will willingly admit that I have spent countless hours being entertained by them. One of my favorites still remains the random expressions written on the blackboard of the beginning of each episode. You can find a list of them here.



These are Vanilla Lovers & Strawberry Berry Berry Good cupcakes with hand-made sugarpaste toppers. They were ordered for a birthday - I imagine the birthday boy or girl is a fan too.



My favorite one to create was Marge with her big blue hair. I had a laugh too when looking up "Doh!" which I always thought was written that way but on every website I checked they had inserted an apostrophe to make it "D'Oh!" I have to ask if that is because my browser defaults to French sites and this is the French version. Or is that really the way it is spelled? Something to contemplate over a donut and mug of Duff.

I'm Walking on Sunshine & Don't It Feel GOOD!

Happy New Year to you all! Hope your 2011 is off to a good start. I had some amazing news about 1 hour in and am hoping it's a sign of all the good stuff that is yet to come.

Yesterday I told you about the young Frenchman, Jerome, I prepared "proposal" cupcakes for. I first met him this summer when he came to me looking for cupcakes for his girlfriend's birthday. She had discovered cupcakes while living in DC during 2009 for a work project and became a little bit obsessed. Several failed home-baking trials later, and after having dragged Jerome to every cupcake shop in Paris looking for the holy grail, frustration set in as nothing lived up to her memories of what she had tasted stateside. A friend of a friend sent them to me and since then, they have become pretty frequent clients. Slowly working their way through just about every flavor on my menu!



In November, Jerome asked me if I would be in Paris over New Year's - that he had something special in mind and wanted to make me a part of it. I was a bit reluctant to commit as I hoped that we would be away on vacation for the holidays but as fate would have it, we were unable to get out of town. Had I known what he had in store, I would have answered with a firm yes right there on the spot.



A few weeks ago, a follow-up email...."I am planning on proposing to Rose-Marie on New Year's Eve and want to do it with cupcakes." Come again? What? Oh my! An order like this only comes around like once in a lifetime and I was so honored that I had been asked to do this! Once I got over my excitement, I turned into a mini bridezilla over the next few weeks. Pouring over cupcake sites looking for the perfect die-cut cupcake wrappers and suggesting all sorts of flavors to Jerome -- champagne-based, rose for Rose-Marie, etc., etc. He quickly came back and told me, "Let's just make it simple, okay? Chocolate, vanilla, pretty but classic." Well, whatever what the customer wants, right?......



Jerome came by yesterday to collect the cupcakes and I have to admit he looked as a cool as a cucumber. I on the other hand was a bundle of nerves. I could barely get the cupcakes in the box my hands were shaking so much and my thoughts were on them all evening! I was so anxious to have news last night and then at 0H53 a text...."elle a dit oui!" (She said yes!). I cannot even begin to describe how happy I am for the young couple. Preparing these cupcakes was a major highlight for me on both a professional and personal level. Wishing Jerome and Rose-Marie all the best for a happy and bright future. I'm already thinking about the cupcake tower I want to build for the wedding; I have just the right decoration design in mind....kidding! Okay, not really! ;P