Honey Soufflés with Pomegranate Glaze

Breakfast?  Indeed.

I totally made this on a whim, which means that the recipe below is less of a real recipe and more of a "what I did."  But it worked!  And it was soo delicious.  The tartness of the glaze went perfectly with the smooth, intense sweetness of the honey.  If I made this again I would probably change some things in the soufflé recipe, for experimental and perfectionist purposes, but to be honest it was really delicious as it was!

Pomegranate Glaze

1/2 cup pomegranate juice

1/4 cup sugar

1/2 tsp lemon juice

Combine all 3 ingredients in a small saucepan, and heat over medium high heat, stirring constantly, until the mixture reduces.  Take off the heat and set aside.  You may need to warm up the glaze again before serving, to get it to a pour-able consistency.  

Honey Soufflé

1/4 cup honey

1 egg yolk

1 egg white

1 tbsp flour

1 tsp granulated sugar

pinch of salt

Preheat oven to 425 F.  Butter and sugar 4 ramekins, and prepare a water bath.  

In one mixing bowl, whisk together the honey and the egg yolk, and then mix in the flour.

In another bowl, whip the egg white with a pinch of salt until you get soft peaks.  Add the granulated sugar and continue whipping until you get stiff peaks. 

Add a little bit of the whipped egg whites to the honey mixture to lighten it.  Then fold the honey mixture into the rest of the egg whites, carefully, just until no streaks are left.  

Pour the batter into the four ramekins, filling them about halfway.  Place the ramekins in the water bath and into the oven.  

Immediately lower the temperature to 400 F.  Bake for 10 minutes at this temperature.

Lower the temperature to 350 F and bake for another 10 minutes.  

Lower the temperature to 300 F and bake for another 10 minutes.  

Then turn the oven off, and leave in the oven with the door closed for 15 to 20 minutes.

When they come out of the oven, invert the soufflés onto plates and drizzle them with the pomegranate glaze.

Honeyed Fluffer Nutter Cupcakes

If I have ever met a cupcake that defined "finger-licking good," then this is surely it.  Sticky, gooey, moist, fluffy, completely drenched in marshmallow, laced with honey... yeah... holy taters.

When I saw that the theme for Quirky Cupcake's March Cupcake Hero Challenge was Marshmallow, the first thought that came to my mind was, "aaahh fluffer nuttersss."  Though I knew that many people would probably take the same path (since come on, it's a classic!), I really just had to do it.  And I am so glad I did, because seriously these cupcakes were amazing!

And as I was planning out my recipe, I kept on fantasizing about having the peanut butter and marshmallow cupcakes, and then drizzling honey all over them!  Oh, the scandalous fantasies I have sometimes...  What can I say, I am as big a fan of peanut butter and honey as I am of peanut butter and marshmallow!  So, why not combine them?  Instead of drizzling the finished cupcakes with honey (I thought this would be too messy and the sweetness would be unbalanced), I decided to add honey to both the cake and the marshmallow.  This proved to be a fabulous idea - the honey gave the cake extra moistness and deepened the flavor, and it just made the marshmallow about 10 times more decadent than it would have been otherwise.  I mean, just the thought of honey marshmallow almost puts me in a sugar-induced coma.  

So the cupcakes ended up being peanut butter honey cake, filled and smothered in honey marshmallow fluff.  As you can see above, I played around with different ways of topping these.  First I tried a peanut butter/marshmallow swirly piping, which looked nice, but in the end, the cupcakes tasted way better with just the marshmallow on top.  As you can see below, they weren't as pretty this way... but oh it really didn't matter.  The next day, most of the marshmallow topping had melted into the cupcakes (omg YES!).  Sooo I just spooned some more over right before eating them, and enjoyed the marshmallow soakage heaven.  

There's really not much more I can say about these cupcakes besides that I urge you to try them if you like peanut butter and marshmallow.  Every bite is packed with flavor.  I've described them as well as I can, but really you just have to taste them to get the full effect!  So on with the recipe!

Honeyed Fluffer Nutter Cupcakes

For the cupcakes:

2 cups cake flour

1 cup boiling water

1 cup sugar

1 cup peanut butter

2 eggs

1/2 cup honey

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

Preheat oven to 375 F.  

Whisk together the eggs with the sugar.  Then add the honey and peanut butter and whisk to combine.  Sift together the cake flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt, and then add them gradually to the wet mixture.  Once everything is incorporated, slowly pour the boiling water into the batter while whisking.  When incorporated, the batter will be very liquidy.  

Pour into lined cupcake tins and put in the oven.  Bake for 5 minutes at 375.  Turn the oven down to 350 and bake for 3 more minutes.  Turn the oven down to 325 and bake for 3 more minutes or until the tops are golden and an inserted knife comes out clean.  Let cool.

For the marshmallow filling/topping:

(adapted from this recipe)

2 egg whites

1 cup light corn syrup

1 1/2 cup powdered sugar

1/2 cup honey

1 tbsp vanilla extract

1/2 tsp salt

Beat the egg whites with the corn syrup and salt until soft peaks form.  

Gradually add the powdered sugar, beating until combined.  

Beat in the honey and vanilla extract.

This makes way more fluff than you'll need for the cupcakes, so you might want to halve the recipe.  I like having the extra so I can add more to the cupcakes right before eating them.  Also, I used the rest of my extra fluff in another delicious creation that is in my oven as I write this!

Bears are Fierce, but Ginger-Honey Bears are FEROSH!

Bears maul people.  ...Fierce?  Maybe.  

These bears will maul you with ginger.  And honey (they're bears!).  And they'll look fabulous in the process.  Now that is some Feroshity.  

But not all bears are made for mauling.  Meet Flowery Bear.... (*cough* RAMI-BEAR)

Flowery Bear is so not fierce.  (Tranny mess, indeeed)

Flowery Bear gets BEARCLAWED!

Muahahahaahahahaha.  He was delicous.

But the other bears were delicously:

Weeeeeee....

For Fierce Ginger Honey Bear Cupcakes:

2 cups all purpose flour

1 cup boiling water

2 eggs

3/4 cup sugar

3/4 cup oil

1/2 cup honey

1 1/2 tsp ground ginger

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

Preheat oven to 325 F.

Whisk together the sugar and eggs in a mixing bowl.  Add the honey and oil, and whisk until well combined.  

Sift together the flour, ginger, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.  Gradually add this to the egg mixture, mixing until incorporated.

Slowly pour the boiling water into the batter, stirring constantly until fully incorporated.  The batter should be liquid.

Pour the batter into lined muffin tins, filling the cups 3/4 of the way.

Bake for 30 minutes and let cool.

Makes about 18 cupcakes.

Creme Anglaise (ok, so I really just needed to use some egg yolks... but this worked really well with the cupcakes!)

1/2 cup milk

1/4 cup heavy cream

2 egg yolks

2 tbsp sugar

1/4 tsp vanilla extract

Whisk the yolks with the sugar in a bowl.  In a small saucepan, heat the milk and cream until it begins to simmer.  Slowly pour the heated milk mixture into the yolk mixture, whisking continuously.  When it is fully incorporated, return the mixture to the saucepan, add the vanilla, and cook over medium low heat, stirring constantly, until mixture thickens.  

When cooled, spoon over the cupcakes.

To decorate the cupcakes, just melt some chocolate, put it in a pastry bag, and have at it!  Have at it in a ferociously creative way, that is.  

Bunnies get claw pwned by bears.  Fact.  =)

Created for the best blogging event ever, hosted by CB of I Heart Cuppycakes.