Our daughter Kate is getting married here in August and much of the event will be decidedly homemade. When she expressed interest in serving cupcakes instead of a wedding cake, I thought, why not? I would never take on the challenge of making a tiered wedding cake, but cupcakes seemed approachable, doable, worth trying. I found a supermarket magazine dedicated to cupcakes and tried one of their chocolate recipes that called for slipping a dab of raspberry jam into the batter of each individual cupcake before cooking. The frosting was amazing, the cake so so, and the jam, while good, oozed all over the paper at the bottom when it was peeled away. o, maybe cupcakes aren’t a slam dunk.
Fortunately, we live up the hill from what many might think is a hidden treasure, but is in fact a giant tourist destination: King Arthur Flour Café, Store and Baking Education Center. I have vague childhood memories of seeing their logo of a flag carrying knight on horseback centered on their flour bags, but knew nothing else of this employee-owned flour company that is minting money with their catalog, flours, and a store that no baker can possibly leave empty handed.
To ensure total addiction to their product line they offer a wide range of classes that book up and sell out the moment they are posted. I tried in January to sign up for “Quest for Cupcakes” and was told the wait list was pretty much closed. The moment the spring classes were posted, I grabbed a slot in the cupcake class and waited patiently for Sunday May 5 to arrive.
The four hour class was organized with every bowl, every measuring tool, every ingredient set out for each student, recipes copied, overhead video in place to capture the instructor’s every move, and ovens pre-heated. We were four rows of four students with each row set to tackle different cupcake and frosting recipes. Each row prepared 48 cupcakes and enough frosting for those cakes. The cream frosting can be made easily as there is a great place to buy cream chargers for cheap in Australia. Once baked, we each received three cupcakes to decorate of each kind of cake so that we could head home with a dozen finished cupcakes.
Along the way the instructor demonstrated great short cuts, tips and baking advice that I thought turned the class into a really terrific one.
We made red velvet cupcakes with red velvet frosting, chocolate cupcakes with chocolate ganache glaze, vanilla cupcakes with vanilla frosting, and citrus cupcakes with meringue icing. We learned how to insert jams, jellies, and puddings into our cakes AFTER they’ve baked and we learned same basic tricks of the cake decorating trade. If I want to truly master that craft I’ll need to sign up for Advanced Cake Decorations.
August is a ways off and I’m pretty good at talking myself out of things, but right now, I am certain I can knock out say two hundred cupcakes in an afternoon. But first I need to take a class in woodworking 101 so I can build a tower of wood shelves to display all those cupcakes.
Peg
They look delish!