2 Easy To Make Cupcake Recipes For School Bake Sales

During the school year, I am often asked to bake cupcakes for the school’s athletic events and for their bi-yearly bake sales. When I am considering what type of cupcakes to bake, I normally stay away from the classic flavors as they will receive plenty of those. If you are looking for something just a tad different, then I would like to suggest the following recipes.

You can frost the first recipe with your favorite flavored frosting, however, the second recipe should be left plain with just the cherry topping. Every time I make these for the bake sale, they are a big hit.

Chocolate Bottom Cupcakes

1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese, softened
1 egg
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
8 ounce chocolate chips
3 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup cocoa powder
2 cups granulated sugar
2 teaspoons baking soda
2 cup water
2 tablespoons vinegar
2/3 cup vegetable oil

In a small bowl, cream together the softened cream cheese, egg, 1/3 cup sugar and salt; set aside. In a large bowl, combine the remaining ingredients together until well mixed. Line a muffin pan with cupcake liners. Spoon batter into each liner approximately 1/2 full. Top that batter with a spoonful of the cream cheese mixture. Bake in a 350 degree oven for approximately 20 minutes or until done. This recipe will make 30-32 cupcakes.

Cherry Cream Cheese Cupcakes

3/4 cup granulated sugar
2 (8 ounce) blocks cream cheese, softened
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1/2 box vanilla wafers
1 large can cherry pie filling

In a large bowl, cream together the granulated sugar and softened cream cheese. Add in the eggs, vanilla extract and lemon juice. Beat mixture with an electric mixer until light and fluffy. Line a muffin pan with cupcake liners. Place 1 vanilla wafer in each of the liners and then spoon batter on top, filling the liner 3/4 of the way full. Bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for 15-18 minutes or until done. Let cupcakes completely cool and then spread cherry pie filling on top.

Transporting: If you do not have a plastic cupcake transporting container, I suggest you purchase some aluminum pans with covers from your local discount store. To keep them stable during transporting, place a piece of rubber matting (like rubber shelf and drawer liner) inside each pan.

Baking Is An Easy Task

For either baking novices or seasoned pros, a dump cake is a no-brainer. To prepare one, you simply dump the ingredients into a bowl and beat them, then pour the batter into a pan and bake it. Although a dump cake is easy to make, it’s just as good as a more fancy cake. Perhaps that’s why dump cakes, including pound cakes, have been popular for hundreds of years.

The secret to the cake is in properly beating the ingredients, so follow these tips. Let the butter soften and take the eggs out of the fridge to warm a bit. For an airy batter, beat the softened butter and sugar really well until the creamed mixture looks pale and wispy. Beat in the eggs and vanilla until all the streaks are gone. Any curdling you might see will disappear as you beat. Turn off the mixer occasionally and scrape the batter at the sides of the bowl into the path of the beaters so everything gets thoroughly mixed.

Switch to low speed when you add the dry ingredients to keep the flour mixture from flying into the air. Since overbeating the flour can toughen a cake, beat only until the batter has no streaks. Stir in the chips by hand so the mixer does not break them.

Be sure the cake is done before you take it out of the oven. You can use either a cake tester, a thin metal wire with a knob on top, or a wooden pick. Gently push the tester into the middle of the cake and pull it out. If you see liquid batter on the tester, keep baking. If the tester comes out clean, remove the cake from the oven and let it cool. A silky-textured pound cake is rich and moist all by itself, so you don’t need to frost it. Just slice and

enjoy!

Double Chocolate Pound Cake

1 loaf cake or 8 servings

Butter

Flour

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

1/4 cup unsweetened baking

cocoa

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 cup butter, softened

(2 sticks)

1 cup sugar

4 eggs

2 teaspoons vanilla

1/2 cup mini chocolate chips

With butter, lightly grease bottom and sides of 8 1/2 x 4 1/2 x 2 1/2 or 9 x 5 x 3-inch loaf pan. Dust with flour. Shake out excess flour. Set aside. With a sifter or mesh strainer, sift 1 1/4 cups flour together with the cocoa and salt into bowl or onto sheet of waxed paper. Set aside.

In large mixer bowl at medium speed, beat together butter and sugar until light and fluffy, about 3 to 5 minutes. Beat in eggs and vanilla until thoroughly blended, at least several minutes. At low speed, gradually beat in reserved flour mixture, 1/2 cup at a time, beating just until blended and no streaks remain. Stir in chips. Spread batter evenly in prepared pan.

Bake in preheated 325 degree F oven until cake begins to pull away from sides of pan and cake tester inserted near center comes out clean, about 60 to 70 minutes for 9-inch pan or 75 to 85 minutes for 8 1/2-inch pan. (If tester shows dark brown, you’ve hit a melted chocolate chip. Test again in another spot. To prevent overbaking, remove cake from oven as soon as no light brown batter shows on tester.) Cool on wire rack 10 minutes. With narrow spatula or knife, loosen cake from pan. Gently shake onto wire rack. Cool completely. To retain moisture, store cooled cake in plastic wrap. Serve plain or topped with fruit, ice cream or whipped cream, if desired.
For either baking novices or seasoned pros, a dump cake is a no-brainer. To prepare one, you simply dump the ingredients into a bowl and beat them, then pour the batter into a pan and bake it. Although a dump cake is easy to make, it’s just as good as a more fancy cake. Perhaps that’s why dump cakes, including pound cakes, have been popular for hundreds of years.

The secret to the cake is in properly beating the ingredients, so follow these tips. Let the butter soften and take the eggs out of the fridge to warm a bit. For an airy batter, beat the softened butter and sugar really well until the creamed mixture looks pale and wispy. Beat in the eggs and vanilla until all the streaks are gone. Any curdling you might see will disappear as you beat. Turn off the mixer occasionally and scrape the batter at the sides of the bowl into the path of the beaters so everything gets thoroughly mixed.

Switch to low speed when you add the dry ingredients to keep the flour mixture from flying into the air. Since overbeating the flour can toughen a cake, beat only until the batter has no streaks. Stir in the chips by hand so the mixer does not break them.

Be sure the cake is done before you take it out of the oven. You can use either a cake tester, a thin metal wire with a knob on top, or a wooden pick. Gently push the tester into the middle of the cake and pull it out. If you see liquid batter on the tester, keep baking. If the tester comes out clean, remove the cake from the oven and let it cool. A silky-textured pound cake is rich and moist all by itself, so you don’t need to frost it. Just slice and

enjoy!

Double Chocolate Pound Cake

1 loaf cake or 8 servings

Butter

Flour

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

1/4 cup unsweetened baking

cocoa

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 cup butter, softened

(2 sticks)

1 cup sugar

4 eggs

2 teaspoons vanilla

1/2 cup mini chocolate chips

With butter, lightly grease bottom and sides of 8 1/2 x 4 1/2 x 2 1/2 or 9 x 5 x 3-inch loaf pan. Dust with flour. Shake out excess flour. Set aside. With a sifter or mesh strainer, sift 1 1/4 cups flour together with the cocoa and salt into bowl or onto sheet of waxed paper. Set aside.

In large mixer bowl at medium speed, beat together butter and sugar until light and fluffy, about 3 to 5 minutes. Beat in eggs and vanilla until thoroughly blended, at least several minutes. At low speed, gradually beat in reserved flour mixture, 1/2 cup at a time, beating just until blended and no streaks remain. Stir in chips. Spread batter evenly in prepared pan.

Bake in preheated 325 degree F oven until cake begins to pull away from sides of pan and cake tester inserted near center comes out clean, about 60 to 70 minutes for 9-inch pan or 75 to 85 minutes for 8 1/2-inch pan. (If tester shows dark brown, you’ve hit a melted chocolate chip. Test again in another spot. To prevent overbaking, remove cake from oven as soon as no light brown batter shows on tester.) Cool on wire rack 10 minutes. With narrow spatula or knife, loosen cake from pan. Gently shake onto wire rack. Cool completely. To retain moisture, store cooled cake in plastic wrap. Serve plain or topped with fruit, ice cream or whipped cream, if desired.

Bread Baking Made Easy!

Don’t you just hate it when you follow a recipe to the letter and when the bread baking is finished the bread not only looks nothing like the recipe book’s picture, but tastes terrible as well??

There is no denying that bread baking as with baking anything is a delicate process.?

Bread baking involves so many things that first time bakers are often discouraged after a few failed attempts to turn out professional looking and tasting loaves.?

Little do they realize that if they only possessed the professional Baker’s secrets bread baking would be so easy that the bread would practically make itself!?

For instance: How many amateur bakers know the secret to keeping bread from sticking to the pan every time??

None! So when they try their hand at bread baking for the first time their bread sticks to the bread pan, and ends up a crumbled mess if they try to force it out.?

Then they cry and give up thinking that the problem lies with them.?

The shocking truth is that it doesn’t! ?

The problem lies with their lack of knowledge of THE baker’s bread ?
baking secret.?

The secret professional chefs and bakers won’t tell you, the secret they guard so jealously.?

My father happened to learn this bread baking secret in his younger baking days and has passed it on to his children ever since.?

Okay, okay, I know you’re probably screaming at me by now ”Beth, get on with it! Tell us the bread baking secret already!”?

So here it is; You will need only one tool besides for the oil and bread pan you already have, and that is quite simply CORNMEAL (you shouldn’t need more than 1/4 to 1/2 cup for two loaves of bread).?

”Cornmeal?” you ask doubtfully. ”YES, cornmeal!”?

No, you do not add the cornmeal to the bread ingredients! That is not the bread baking secret.?

What you do is you oil your pan as usual, and you lightly sprinkle cornmeal on all of the sides and bottom of the bread pan.?

Now you can safely place your bread dough into the pans without fear of it sticking to them.?

While your bread is baking instead of sticking to the pan, your bread will stick to the cornmeal and slide easily out of the pan when done baking.?

You may need to use a butter knife and slide it in between the pan and the bread before turning the pan over and allowing your bread to pop out.?

A lot of the time this will be unnecessary however and your bread will pop out just by your turning the bread pan upside down.?

You will probably also want to use the butter knife to scrape the excess cornmeal off the bottom and sides of the bread as you may not care for the taste of cornmeal.?

This bread baking secret will work whether you’re baking a batter bread or a rising bread (also called yeast bread). I personally use it for both.?

Here is another treasured bread baking secret, this one only for batter breads: ?

On the last ten minutes of its baking time cover the bread pan containing the batter bread with another bread pan (a steel bread pan works best), and leave it on until the bread is finished baking.?

This will keep the batter bread from burning or becoming too hard on top. You may vary the time you leave the steel bread pan on according to how your batter bread usually looks when it is finished.?

If it is a very dark brown on top and difficult to slice because the top is so hard, then 20 minutes will work best. But if it is just a little too hard on top and a little too brown the 10 minutes should suffice.?

Do not cover the bread at all if it usually comes out golden and soft on top after the baking is completed.?

You may also glaze a batter bread on top with a tablespoon of melted butter mixed with a tablespoon of honey, and sprinkle some flaked coconut or sliced nuts on top of that. ?

To glaze you start by taking the bread out of the oven five minutes before the required baking time is finished, then spread the butter/honey mixture on top of the bread, sprinkle on your coconut or chopped nuts and bake for the remaining 5 minutes.?

Here is another useful bread baking tip for rising breads…?

If your bread loaves over rise (say because you were busy and forgot about them), then you can use a pair of scissors to cut off the excess sides, being careful not to cut any dough from off of the top.?

You may then use this excess dough to make rolls. You simply oil a pizza or cookie sheet and form the dough into several small balls.?

Rise them for another half hour and then bake on 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 15 to 20 minutes or until golden brown.?

Do yourself a favor and put these tried and tested bread baking secrets immediately to use in your kitchen, and your family will rave over the results.