Apple Pie - Week 12

 A few weeks ago we took our boys to a local apple orchard and it inspired me to start looking for apple cupcake recipes.   Delicious yet slightly messy to eat.  Enjoy!!! 
 
Apple Pie Cupcakes

Adapted from Annie's Eat

Yield: 24 cupcakes

 Ingredients:

For the cupcakes:

3 cups sifted cake flour

1 tbsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. salt

1/2  tsp cinnamon 

1 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature

2 cups sugar

4 eggs

1 ½ tsp. vanilla extract

1 cup milk

For the apple filling: (I doubled the filling recipe to fill 24 cupcakes)

2 tbsp. butter

2 tsp. cinnamon

2-4 tbsp. sugar

3 large apples, peeled, cored and diced  (I used Yellow Delicious)  

To make the cupcakes, preheat the oven to 350°.  Line two cupcake pans with paper liners.

In a medium bowl, sift together the cake flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon.  In the bowl of an electric mixer, cream the butter and sugar together on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes.  Beat in the eggs one at a time, mixing well and scraping down the sides of the bowl after each addition.  Add the vanilla extract and mix well to combine.  Add in the dry ingredients alternately with the milk, beginning and ending with the dry ingredients.  Stir until just combined.

Divide the batter evenly among the cupcake liners, filling them about 2/3-3/4 full.  Bake until golden and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, about 18 to 22 minutes.  Remove from the oven and allow to cool for 5 minutes in the pans.  Transfer to wire racks to cool completely.

To make the apple filling, heat the butter a medium skillet over medium-high heat.  Add the cinnamon and sugar and cook for a minute, until the mixture begins to bubble.  Lower the heat to medium and stir in the apples.  Mix well.  Cook until the apples are somewhat tender, about 10 minutes.  Remove from heat and let cool.

While the apple mixture is cooling,  use the cone method to remove a chunk from the center of each cupcake, making sure to leave a rim around the top of the cupcake.  Fill the holes with the cooled apple mixture.  What's the cone method?  It's pretty simple.  Use a knife to cut out a cone shape out of the center of your cupcake. 

 I drizzled a caramel syrup over the tops and then topped them off with a swirl of vanilla buttercream. 

Caramel Syrup

15 caramels

2-4 T half in half

Place unwrapped caramels and half in half in a microwave bowl.  Heat for 1min 30seconds, stir well.  Continue to heat in 30 sec increments until mixture is smooth.  

Vanilla Buttercream

1/2 c unsalted butter

1/2 c Crisco

4 cups confectioners sugar

1 1/2 tsp Vanilla

2-4 T half in half

Cream butter and Crisco.  Beat in sugar until fluffy, approximately 2 minutes.  Mix in sugar and Vanilla.  Add half in half one tablespoon at a time until frosting is the desired consistency.