"Crappy" Baking Tutorial

Tuesday night Brian informs me that he signed up to bring dessert for their pot luck Friday.

Thanks for the notice.

He wants to take my Keebler Cookie Salad; of course he wants to take the one dish I have absolutely NOTHING in the house to make.

How about some cupcakes? I have everything I need to make those. (uh huh, sure you do!)

I decided to make salted caramel cupcakes and devil's food cupcakes topped with cookie dough frosting. You can find links for the recipes for both here.

This is where the fun began.

I begin making the salted caramel cupcakes. I always cream the butter, add brown sugar, then all of the liquid ingredients, then all of the dry.  I get to the bottom of my liquid list... CRAP! I don't have buttermilk!

Quickly look up buttermilk substitutes and congratulate myself on having plain vanilla yogurt and milk to make an acceptable substitute.

Complete recipe, dig out pans... CRAP! Do I have enough cupcake papers?

Wheew- 1 (and only 1) package in the cabinet.

Load up two pans and throw them in the oven. Start the chocolate cupcakes. Measure, dump, mix... "this looks really dark, and smells really rich... what did I do?"

CRAP!- I neglected the prime ingredient in any good devil's food recipe- sour cream!

Dig out the sour cream and add it to the bowl... much better!

Prep & load pans, finish just as the timer for the caramel batch sounds.

Switch out pans and let caramel cupcakes cool as I start mixing the frosting.  As the butter is creaming, I dig out my container of powdered sugar. 

Wait, how much does it say I need? CRAP- there is NOT 8 cups of powdered sugar in here!

Frantically rummage and find a new bag of powdered sugar.  Woo-hoo, 32 oz!

Simultaneously realize I just used the last of the brown sugar in the container for the cupcakes and I need more for the cookie dough frosting. CRAP!

Rummage round 2. Find 2 new packages of brown sugar- score!

Caramel frosting is made, cupcakes are cool. Time to frost!

CRAP- I don't have any pastry bags!

Attempt to make a bag out of waxed paper, which is a flop. CRAP!

Try using a sandwich baggie with the corner cut, seam busts. Double CRAP!

It's at this point I realize the frosting is holding whatever shape I dump it out of... 

Begin rolling frosting into balls and press onto cupcakes- genius!

Complete caramel cupcakes and take picture just before timer for chocolate cupcakes goes off.

As the chocolate cupcakes cool, I mix the cookie dough frosting.

Remember a second time that I have no pastry bags- CRAP!

Decide to use the "dollop" method. Finish chocolate cupcakes and sprinkle with chocolate chips. Take picture.

Realize I have 24 cupcakes that look nice and professional and 24 cupcakes that look like my almost 3-year old decorated them.

Oh well. It's just for the hubby and the 10 people at their branch... I think these'll do. 

So there you have it: the 9 "CRAP" method of baking.