I've been craving baked goods lately, so I decided to look to the cake thread for inspiration. Sadly, this recipe didn't turn out quite as well as I'd hoped, but it has given me inspiration for future baking adventures, so... stay tuned!
Chocolate-Rooibos Cupcakes with Caramel Buttercream
Adapted slightly from C&C Cakery (via Something Awful)
2 Tbsp. rooibos tea (I used rooibos chai)
1 c. boiling water
1 2/3 c. all-purpose flour
1 Tbsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 c. cocoa powder
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1/2 c. canola oil
4 eggs, separated
1 c. sugar
1/2 c. brown sugar
pinch cream of tartar
0. Place egg whites in a large bowl and place in fridge until needed.
1. Pour boiling water over tea and set aside to steep for ~15 minutes.
2. Meanwhile, combine flour, baking powder, and salt in a small bowl.
3. In a separate bowl, combine cocoa powder, vanilla, and oil.
4. When the tea is done steeping, strain it (or remove the bags).
5. In a large bowl, beat the egg yolks and sugars together.
6. Pour the cocoa mixture into the sugar and mix until blended.
7. Pour the tea in, a bit at a time, and mix until blended.
8. Gradually add the flour.
9. WASH YOUR BEATERS.
10. Get the egg whites out of the fridge and add a pinch of cream of tartar.
11. Whip until they form soft peaks. (I think mine were closer to stiff peak stage. Seems to have worked out okay though.)
12. Scoop about 1/4 of the whipped egg whites into the batter and stir them in well to loosen the batter.
13. Add the rest of the egg whites and very gently fold them in.
14. Pour ~1/3 c. batter into cupcake liners (in a muffin tin) and bake at 350F for 16-18 minutes.
15. Allow to cool completely before icing.
Caramel Buttercream
6 Tbsp. heavy cream
1 tsp. rooibos tea
1 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
6 Tbsp. sugar
3 Tbsp. water
3/4 c. unsalted butter, room temperature
2 1/2 c. icing sugar
1. Warm cream in the microwave (20-30 seconds).
2. Stir in tea leaves and set aside to steep for 15 minutes or so.
3. When tea is done steeping, strain and stir in vanilla.
4. Combine sugar and water in a small pot or pan and cook over medium heat until mixture just begins to brown.
5. Remove from heat and pour in cream while whisking.
6. Cream butter. Sift in icing sugar while continuing to beat.
7. Pour in caramel and mix until blended.
The actual cake part of these cupcakes was fine. They had a nice texture. Were light, but chocolate-y. And the rooibos did come through a bit. The icing, on the other hand, was a disaster. First of all, the original recipe calls for 1 1/2 CUPS of butter! Seeing as I didn't want to use up 3/4 of a pound of butter in one go, I decided to just do a half batch of icing and deal with maybe not having enough for all the cupcakes. All I can say is it's a good thing I decided to start with a half batch!
I can only assume that the recipe author had a brain fart and actually meant 1 1/2 STICKS of butter. I did up a half batch of the icing according to the recipe and it just tasted like butter. After adding the full amount of icing sugar, it was actually starting to taste like icing, if somewhat bland. So I figured that it must've been a typo and made up another batch of caramel to add to it as well. Since the first bit of caramel didn't really seem to have much presence in the icing, I decided to do the second batch with brown sugar to boost the flavour a little bit.
It still just tasted like vanilla icing.
So, now I had twice as much icing as I'd originally intended to make and, while it was inoffensive, it didn't really seem to have much going on. It was very sweet and very bland.
What I probably should've done at this point was make up another small batch of caramel to mix in. But I was tired and frustrated and I had a little bit of condensed milk sitting in the fridge. So, I decided to try making dulce de leche. And then, because I wanted to make sure that the icing actually tasted of something this time, I added an extra Tbsp. of brown sugar to the milk while it cooked. And then, in my quest to get it just a bit darker and just a bit more flavourful... I went a bit too far and ended up cooking the milk right down to a sort of stiff, extremely chewy caramel candy. Which, needless to say, did not mix into the buttercream terribly well.
At that point, I gave up on the idea of trying to get this icing to take on any sort of flavour and just decided to roll with sugary, slightly vanilla-scented frosting with chunks of chewy caramel embedded in it. Not ideal, but I wasn't really willing to keep fiddling with it.
Honestly, I think what I'd like to do is redesign the whole recipe from the ground up. I think the chocolate-rooibos-caramel flavour combo has potential, but none of them really got to shine here. So, here's what I'm thinking for round two:
Rooibos Velvet Cake with Dulce de Leche and Butterscotch Frosting
Adapted from a red velvet cake recipe in the Something Awful cake thread
1 1/4 c. buttermilk
2 Tbsp. rooibos
1 c. butter, room temperature
1 c. brown sugar
1/2 c. granulated sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp. vinegar
1 tsp. vanilla extract
2 1/2 c. all-purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp. baking soda
3 Tbsp. cocoa powder
1/8 tsp. salt
1. In a small saucepan, gently warm the buttermilk.
2. Add the tea, set aside, and allow to steep.
3. In a separate bowl, cream the butter with the sugars until light and fluffy.
4. Beat in the egg.
5. Strain buttermilk and add to batter.
6. Stir in vinegar and vanilla.
7. In a separate bowl, combine flour, baking soda, cocoa, and salt.
8. Stir dry ingredients into batter until just mixed.
9. Pour into two greased and floured 9" pans and bake at 350F for 30-35 minutes.
10. Let cool completely.
Butterscotch Frosting
1/2 c. brown sugar
2 large egg white
1/2 tsp. salt
12 Tbsp. butter
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
1. Combine sugar, egg white, and salt in a heatproof bowl.
2. Heat mixture over simmering water, whisking constantly, for 2-3 minutes (until it reaches 150F).
3. Remove from heat and beat on medium speed for 1-2 minutes.
4. Add butter, one Tbsp. at a time, and beat until smooth.
5. Mix in vanilla.
6. Increase speed to medium high and beat until light and fluffy.
Assembly
1 can sweetened condensed milk
2 layers cake
1 recipe butterscotch frosting
1. Pour the condensed milk into a baking dish and bake until darkened.
2. Place first layer upside down on plate.
3. Spread with dulce de leche.
3a. Optionally, spread a bit of frosting over the dulce de leche.
4. Place second layer (right way up) on top of dulce de leche filling.
5. Frost top and sides of cake.
Obviously I haven't tried out the above recipe yet, so I can't vouch for it. I just thought it might be interesting to replace the food colouring in a red velvet recipe with rooibos and see how it goes. Red velvet cakes already have the slightly chocolate-y thing going on. And I'm not a big fan of all the red food colouring anyway. So I figured this might be an interesting way to play with the chocolate-rooibos combo.
Meanwhile, the suggested butterscotch frosting for this particular red velvet cake sounds somewhat more promising than the caramel buttercream given above. It's got the same amount of butter, but much less sugar. And what sugar there is is brown. And the presence of the egg whites should hopefully give it some body without relying on either icing sugar or yet more butter. *fingers crossed!*
Hopefully I'll be able to take this particular combo for a test run soon and see how my theory pans out. I'll try to do another write-up for it and share the results when I do.
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