For the love of cupcakes

Who doesn't love a cupcake? They are perfectly portioned little bites of heaven. What's more, they give me an excuse to wield my pastry bag.


I dream of piping, creating flowers, making buttercream frosting, chocolate ganache.... It's becoming borderline obsessive.

Just before the holidays, I caved and bought a pastry bag kit. My "starter kit" included petal, star and round tips. Of course I had muffins in the house — carrot oatbran — so I figured why not frost them with cream cheese for a healthy after dinner treat? My first attempt:

From there, I have been looking for any excuse to bake and frost cupcakes.


One of the first batches I made were rum raisin mini cupcakes with rum glaze and rum frosting. They were so delicious, I didn't even get to take of picture of them.

Another batch that didn't receive photographic evidence were gingerbread mini cupcakes with orange-ginger frosting. I brought them to an open house party and convinced myself that eating four of them was equivelent to eating one standard-size cupcake.

For our special Hanukkah dinner I made chocolate Frambois cupcakes with raspberry frosting. They were quite lovely.

The obsession continued with a batch of lowfat orange chocolate cupcakes for dinner guests:

And then I found an excuse to use my naturally dyed red, white, and green jellybeans at Christmas-time:

Most recently, we hosted our annual holiday open house. With kids afoot, I thought brightly colored mini cupcakes would be a fun treat. Earlier in the week I had roasted beets, so I used the beet juice to create a fushia frosting. The cupcakes were devoured by kids and grown-ups alike.

What's for dinner? Molasses-brined pork chops

Molasses-brined pork chops are a weeknight favorite in our house. The recipe may sound complex, but with careful planning it's rather simple. Brining not only adds depth and flavor to the pork chops, it makes the chops exceptionally tender.

I begin by brining the pork chops in a mixture of water, molasses, brown sugar, sea salt, vanilla and ice cubes. Leave to brine for at least eight hours and up to two days.

Meanwhile, I create a spice rub with using dried sage from our summer farm share, garlic, cloves, cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice and black pepper. Once the pork chops are removed from the brine and patted dry, I dredge them in seasoned flour.

The spice mixture is then rubbed on both sides of the pork chops, and they are refrigerated for at least 30 minutes before they are broiled to perfection. Although this recipe does require some advance planning, with a little preparation, it can make an extraordinary weeknight meal.

The broiled pork chops go well with a variety of side dishes:



molasses-brined pork chops with roasted root vegetables



molasses-brined pork chops with roasted brussel sprouts and tzimmes



molasses-brined pork chops with cheddar grits and collard greens