BANANA RAMA!!

Finally a recipe that tastes like a banana CUPCAKE and not a banana muffin! It's perfectly light and fluffy--truly amazing for homemade! To top it off, Cinnamon Cream Cheese frosting...PURE HEAVEN!

Banana Cupcakes
Adapted from lfamily5

3 cups Cake Flour (not self-rising)
1 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking powder
1 stick unsalted butter-softened
1/2 cup oil
2 cups sugar
3 large eggs
4 VERY ripe bananas- mashed well
6 Tb buttermilk
1 1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 325 degrees

Line cupcake pans with paper liners
In a small bowl, whisk flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt-set aside.

In a large bowl on medium speed, cream butter and oil until smooth. Add sugar and beat until fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time mixing well after each. Add bananas and half of the dry ingredients until combined. Add buttermilk and vanilla, then add remaining dry ingreds. until just combined--making sure not to over mix! Cake will turn out dry!

Bake for 20 minutes--or until you lightly touch top of cupcake and center springs back. Careful not to over bake. Let cupcakes cool in pan for 5 minutes before transferring to cooling rack.

Cinnamon Cream Cheese Frosting

2 cubes butter--softened
1 (8oz) pkg. cream cheese
about 6 cups powdered sugar--give or take
2 1/2 tsp cinnamon--or to your liking
2 tsp vanilla
dash of salt

Cream butter and cream cheese. Add powdered sugar one cup at a time until you get the right consistency. Mix in cinnamon, vanilla, and salt. You can add a little milk if the frosting gets too thick.

Zucchini Zucchini Zucchini!

Say zucchini over and over again really fast...it starts to sound like skinny-funny, huh? Anyway, it's that time of year when zucchini is coming out of our ears! But I don't mind, I truly love this vegetable. So many things to make with it, and so little time before it starts to rot!
Here's my wanna make zucchini recipe list for this season:

-Lora's Zucchini Soup
-Shanadee's Chocolate Zucchini Bread
-Taste of Home's Zucchini Chicken Pasta
-Pioneer Woman's Zucchini Fritters
-and last but not least, find a killer Fried Zucchini recipe-like the one I had when I was 10 years old, I haven't found one as good since! Laura, you're the only one who really understands this! You were at the restaurant with me and we both know we haven't been the same since!




Zucchini Cupcakes with Brown Sugar Frosting
adapted from Taste of Home-makes 2 dozen

Preheat oven to 350 degrees-place cupcake liners in 2 muffin pans.

3 eggs
1 1/3 cup sugar
1/2 cup oil
1/2 cup orange juice
1 tsp almond extract-optional
2 1/2 cup flour
2 tsp cinnamon
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ground cloves
1 1/2 cup finely grated zucchini

In a med. size bowl beat eggs-add sugar, oil, oj, and extract. Mix well. In another bowl whisk all dry ingreds. and add to egg mixture stirring well to combine-fold in zucchini.

Add filling to muffin pans. Fill 3/4 full in each cup. Bake for 20 minutes. Cool.

Brown Sugar Frosting

1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup butter-room temp.
1/4 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla
2 cups powdered sugar

In a saucepan combine brown sugar, butter, and milk. Bring to a boil over med. heat-cook and stir for 2 minutes. Remove from heat-add vanilla and whisk in powdered sugar until it's nice and smooth. It will be sort of runny. Kindof in between a glaze and frosting. Frost cupcakes right away or frosting will start to harden.

What the world needs now...is more CUPCAKES!

Insanely moist chocolate cake with chocolate chips, with chocolate frosting with toffee bits...could there be anything better? These babies were a major hit! I'd say these are a cure for all of your problems! I'm trying to eat dessert once a week, instead of daily. So maybe my taste buds were a little amped up-but really, my weekend was blissful thanks to these.

I've seen this recipe on a number of blog sites, so who knows who gets the credit. One way Sisters Cafe made this was in bundt form with dripping luscious frosting. I've been told it's also amazingly good.

Insanely Moist Chocolate Cupcakes

1 Devils food cake mix
1 small box (4oz) instant chocolate pudding
4 eggs
1 cup sour cream (not low-fat or fat-free)
1/2 cup warm water
1/2 cup oil
1 1/2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
You will need 3 muffin pans. Line only 2 1/2 of the pans with paper cups. Give or take a few.

Place all ingredients except chocolate chips in mixer. Blend for 30 seconds scraping sides of bowl. Continue to mix on med. speed for 2 minutes. Stir in chocolate chips. Scoop 1/4 cup of batter into each cup. Bake for 18 - 20 minutes or until tops springs back when touched. Let cool.

*Recipe update: I recently made these with only 1/2 cup sour cream and they were just as moist and yummy!

My Favorite Chocolate Frosting

1 stick butter - softened
1/2 cup cocoa powder
1/3 cup half & half (you can use heavy whipping cream or whole milk)
1 1/2 tsp pure vanilla
4 to 5 cups powdered sugar
pinch of salt

In an electric mixer beat butter until creamy. Add cocoa until just combined. Add vanilla, salt and 1 cup powdered sugar. Mix until combined. On low, pour in a little of the milk alternating with powdered sugar 1 cup at a time. Mix until you get the consistency you like.