Getting Baked.

After Christmas, I bought a book.  Baked: New Frontiers in Baking by Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito is a recipe book filled with recipes from their bakery "Baked" in Brooklyn.  This is full of twists on classics, as well as baked items that are unique, like the Chocolate Malt Ball Cake.

This week as Tim's father's birthday.  I was put in charge of the dessert for his celebration dinner.  I decided to make something from Baked, so I decided on the banana cupcakes.

First, sift together 2 3/4 cups flour with 1 1/2 tsp baking powder, 1 tsp baking soda and 1/2 tsp salt.  Set aside.

Beat together 1 stick of butter with 1/4 cup vegetable shortening.

Add 2 tsp vanilla extract with 1 3/4 cup of white sugar.  Beat to combine.

Add 2 eggs and beat to combine.

Now for the bananas.

Mash them up.

Add to the mixture.

Beat to combine.

We'll need a bit more liquid before we add the dry stuff, and that comes from buttermilk.  1/2 a cup.

Alternately add the flour mixture and buttermilk 3 times, starting and ending with flour (so flour, milk, flour, milk, flour).

Bake in a 325 degree oven for 25 minutes.

Time for the icing.  Baked included a vanilla pastry cream to slather on top, but I didn't have the ingredients for it.  I decided to make a vanilla infused cream cheese frosting.  I started with one 8 oz pack of plain cream cheese and added about a tablespoon of vanilla extract.

After beating this together, I slowly started adding about 1 cup of powdered sugar.

A lot sweeter than I normally make it, but it worked with the vanilla.

Once the cupcakes are out of the oven and cooled, it's time to ice and decorate.

These tasted like banana pudding after the application of the icing.  I'll call this one a success!

Enjoy!