"Award-Winning" Banana-Peanut Butter cupcakes

Hey y'all!
I have a lot of excitement happening right now.
http://pinterest.com/pin/24840235414934941/?timeline=1 go ahead. Click on this link. I dare you. Anderson Cooper, silver fox of CNN and the Anderson show, pinned MY kale chip recipe on his Pintrest, then tweeted about it. How exciting is this? i will tell you how exciting it is. IT'S FREAKING EXCITING!
I have my dear friend Andrea to thank for this. She sent in the link, figuring hey why the hell not. And ta dam! that means he looked it up. Or his people did. Whomever, more publicity for me!

2nd thing. This recipe got me 1st place at my works annual contest. Helllll yeah! These two events sort of confirmed and lit up my desire to do this cookbook. Just when I thought this was a lot of work, a lot of time and a lot of money, trying to decide whether it was a good idea or not, the universe put me back on my path.

It's nice to know other people than my friends and family like my recipes :)

OK! So here we go!

Banana-Peanut Butter cupcakes

Cupcakes :

• 1 1/2 cups of flour
• 3 mashed, ripped bananas
• 3/4 cups of sugar
• 1 teaspoon of salt
• 1 tablespoon of vanilla
• 1/2 of butter or margarine
• 1 egg
• 1 tablespoon of baking soda

1. Pre-heat oven to 350.
2. Beat the butter, sugar, egg and bananas together, using a hand mixer or stand mixer. Or just the good 'ol elbow grease.  
3. Add the vanilla.
4. Incorporate the flour, salt and baking soda. Beat well.
5. Fill in cupcake/muffin molds. You can grease them first or line them with cupcake liners.
6. Bake for about 20 minutes. Using a toothpick, press it in the middle of one of the cakes. If the batter sticks then leave them for another 5 minutes.

Makes 12 normal size cupcakes or 28-30 mini ones.

Frosting:

• 1/3 cup of butter, at room temperature (could be vegan, margarine, or even shortening)
• 1 1/2 cup of peanut butter (I've used Kraft smooth)
• 1/2 cup of icing sugar.

1. Beat all the ingredients until the frosting is smooth and fluffy. You can adjust the peanut taste by adding or using less peanut butter. If you notice the consistency is a bit too thin, you can add sugar.
2. Ice the cupcakes. And enjoy!



These little guys are really good. They have that trusty banana-peanut butter combo. They are light, the frosting is fluffy, it melts in your mouth. It isn't for nothing that it won ;)

Try them out! Share them. People will love you that much more afterwards. Just make sure they aren't allergic! 

A little bit of heaven... in your mouth

credit: Stephane Perrault

Howdy! I know, it's been nearly a month since the last post. I really need to get back on the horse of this project and blog/test more often.

BUT, I'll make it up to you. I have for you today a couple of new recipes. YAY! Soooo excited! haha
Saturday, my dear friend Luc lend me his kitchen and invited over some of our amazing friends (and a new one! Well... new for me lol). It was the perfect time to try out a couple of recipes on them, mouahahahha.

According to the grades they gave on the food, the average, out of 10, was 9. So I am assuming they loved it and hope you will too!

We started off with a trio of goat cheese in tiny edible cups.

• 2 packs of soft, plain goat cheese, at room temperature
• 3/4 cup of whipping cream
• 3 bulbs of garlic, roasted
• 1 pack of smoked salmon
• 2 green onions, finely chopped
• 1 apple, diced into tiny pieces
• 1 tablespoon of cinnamon
• 1 tablespoon of oil
• 1 teaspoon of sugar
• Cups (i will get you the name asap)

1. For starters, roast your garlic. Simply cut the top of the bulbs, place them on a baking sheet. Drizzle a bit of olive oil, sprinkle salt and pepper and roast in a pre-heated oven (400) for about 20-30 minutes.
2. While the garlic is roasting, take a small sauce pan, drizzle a bit of oil (about a tablespoon). Over medium-low heat, drop in the apple, the sugar and cinnamon. Mix and cook until the apple is soft. (About 10 minutes) Let cool.
3. Using a mixer, drop in the goat cheese and whisk away. Little by little, pour in the cream and keep whisking till everything is smooth and fluffy.
4. In 3 bowls, separate the cheese, equally.
5. In the first bowl, take the cloves out of the garlic bulb and squeeze them into the cheese. This part is a bit messy and oily. Mix well and set aside for about 30 minutes. The flavor of the garlic will be more potent.
6. In the second bowl, pour the apple sauce you just made and mix. Set aside as well.
7. In the third bowl, pop in the green onions. Thinly and finely chop the smoked salmon. Drop it in with the goat cheese and onions and mix well. Sprinkle a bit of salt and pepper and let sit.
8. Finally, take the tiny cups and fill them with the cheese mixtures, using a small spoon. And enjoy!

You could easily spread these cheesy deliciousness's on bread or even mix them into pasta.

credit: Stephane Perrault

After that decadent amuse bouche, we had the squash pottage (I wanted to try it out on other people) and a lovely veggie panini.

For the panini I used (for 5):

• 5 Moroccan style flat breads, whole wheat and flax seed
• 1/4 cup of mayo
• 1 and a half of chopped chipotle pepper (you can add more for some extra spiciness)
• 1/4 cup of pesto (I used store bought, but I will post a recipe for pesto soon!)
• 2 large tomatoes, sliced
• 2 zucchinis, thinly sliced
• 5 sliced of provolone
• 2 onions, caramelized (see lasagna recipe)

1. In a small bowl, mix the mayo and chipotle peppers. Set aside
2. Spread the spicy mayo on one slice of the bread. The pesto on the other.
3. On top of the mayo, layer some onions, tomato slices, zucchini and provolone. Top it with the other slice of bread and pop it in a panini grill for about 5 minutes. If you do not have a grill, you can use a frying pan. Same way you would make a grilled cheese. Just make sure you press on the sandwich a couple of times. And flip.

This panini, I thought, goes really well with the comforting squash pottage.

credit: Stephane Perrault

And finally, dessert. I took the vegan chocolate brownie recipe, and changed it up to make it even more chocolaty.  

Brownie:

• 2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour 
•  ¾ cup sugar
• ½ teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 1/2 cup of melted semi-sweet chocolate
• 1½ teaspoons vanilla extract
• ⅓ cup canola oil
• 1 tablespoon white distilled vinegar
• 1 cup cold water
• 1 cup of fresh blueberries

1. Mix the dry ingredients.
2. Incorporate the wet ingredients EXCEPT for the chocolate.
3. Incorporate little by little the melted chocolate.
4. Drop in the blueberries. Mix.
5. In a 8 by 8 greased cake pan, pour the mixture. Pop it in a pre-heated 350 degrees oven and bake for about 30 minutes.

For the whipped chocolate side:

• 1 1/2 cup of whipping cream
• 1 cup of melted chocolate
• 1/4 cup of sugar
• 1 tablespoon of vanilla

1. Using a hand or stand mixer, whip the cream. You can do it with a manual mixer if you do not have the electronic ones. It will, however, take more time and some elbow grease.
2. Add the sugar and vanilla.
3. Add the melted chocolate. You will notice that the whip cream will become dense and "grainy" looking. It's ready then.

Take out your favorite plates, cut out a big piece of cake and add the whipped chocolate and ennnnnnnjoy!

credit: Stephane Perrault

Let me know if you tried it, liked it or hated it! Hopefully you LOVED it. :)

(Liked the pictures? Thought they were professionnal and artsy looking? You should see what other things my friend Stephane can do. Please check out his blog! http://sperrault.blogspot.ca/)