Pumpkin Spice Cupcakes

Recently, Betsy had a bake sale at school (yes they still have bake sales in law school) and the options were either A) Nick bakes something or B) Funfetti.  Not that I’m dissing on Funfetti… I actually love the stuff, but I figured we might not be the only bake sale participants who thought to bring it.

Given the season, I thought I would make some delicious pumpkin spice cupcakes for Betsy to bring!  I topped the pumpkin cupcakes with cream cheese frosting because I’m always looking for an excuse to top something in cream cheese frosting.  I also threw on some candy corns left over from my cocktail adventures.

I got this recipe from a really good baker I know who has actually contributed to Macheesmo before.  The pumpkin cupcakes are simple to make and have a very interesting twist on the normal cupcake recipe:  brown butter.  The nuttiness of the butter with the pumpkin and spices was a pretty amazing combo.

Pumpkin Spice Cupcakes (Thanks Chris!)
Makes about 20 normal sized cupcakes

Dry Mixture:
- 340 g. all-purpose flour (2 3/4 cups)
- 2 Teaspoons cinnamon
- 2 Teaspoons ground clove
- 2 Teaspoons nutmeg (fresh grated is best)
- 1 Teaspoon baking soda
- 1 Teaspoon baking powder
- 1 Teaspoon salt

Wet Mixture:
- 228 g. butter (1 Cup)
- 500 g. sugar (2 1/2 Cups)
- 2 Eggs
- 2 Egg yolks
- 1 15 ounce can pumpkin puree (be sure to get the 100% pumpkin puree, not the pumpkin pie filling.)

Helpful Equipment:
- Microplane (for nutmeg or buy it ground already)
- Cupcake Pan
- Digital Scale (Best tool you can buy to ensure consistent baking results)

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

The Dry Stuff.  Get all of your dry ingredients ready.  I think it’s pretty important to weigh baking ingredients as my cup of flour is going to be slightly different than your cup of flour, but grams are grams no matter what.

Basically, just combine all of these ingredients in a medium bowl and whisk together well to make sure everything is combined!

The Wet Ingredients: For the future detectives reading, yes, there are three sticks of butter and three eggs and three egg yolks below, but only two of each in the recipe.  That’s because I needed about 30 cupcakes, not 20.

Making the brown butter.  Most cake recipes require that you cream the butter which involves (normally) using a mixer to beat the crap out of the butter and sugar to make sure that every little grain of sugar is coated in butter.

This recipe uses a different approach though which I immediately fell in love with.  You make a brown butter and then pour that over the sugar and stir it up!  It adds an awesome level of flavor to the final cake and I think it’s easier than creaming the butter and sugar together, but gives you the same results.

Update: As a few commenters have pointed out, you can’t always substitute brown butter for creaming butter.  In this recipe it works well, but it’s a different physical process.

To make the brown butter, just put all of your butter in a saucepan over medium-high heat.  Let it melt and continue to cook, stirring occasionally.  It will foam some and eventually the milk solids will start to brown and even burn a little bit.  This takes about 5 minutes maybe.

Take it off the heat when it looks like this:

Strain this! You don’t want those little burned bits in your cupcakes, just the lovely browned butter.  Straining it is key.  If you don’t have a good strainer, you can use a coffee filter!

Then pour all your brown butter into a bowl with all of your sugar and mix it up.  It will look like brown sugar and smell amazing.

Finishing the Batter.  The hardest part is over!  Next, add your eggs and additional egg yolks to your sugar mixture.  Then add your pumpkin puree and finally whisk in your dry ingredients in two batches.  Don’t over mix the batter.  Just make sure all your flour is incorporated well and then stop.

Next, using a 1/3 cup measuring cup, fill up your cupcake pan!  Anytime I’m making cupcakes, I like to use the paper inserts which make for easy transport.  Fill the papers about 3/4 of the way full.  Don’t fill them all the way to the top or you will have some serious overflow happening.

Baking the Cupcakes.  These need to bake for about 25 minutes in the middle rack of the oven or until a toothpick comes out clean from the center.  I would check them at 20 – my oven is a bit unreliable I’ve learned.

Look at these beauties!

After these come out, move them to a wire rack until they are completely cooled.  Take them out of the pan after a few minutes, but make sure they are not hot or even warm before you frost. I let mine sit for about an hour before even trying to frost them.  If they are even slightly warm you run the risk of melting your frosting and melted frosting makes for a very sad cupcake.

Speaking of frosting, let’s make that:

Cream Cheese Frosting

- 1 8 ounce package cream cheese
- 1/2 Cup Butter (1 stick) at room temperature
- 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 2 Cups powdered sugar, sifted

Mix your butter and cream sugar together using a hand mixer (or whisk I guess) until the mixture is well combined and smooth.  Mix it for a few minutes on medium speed until it starts to get light and airy.  Then add your vanilla and finally sift in your powdered sugar, 1 Cup at a time.

You’ll end up with a very smooth and sturdy frosting!

Once the cupcakes are cooled you can top them which as much frosting as you can handle and decorate accordingly!

I must brag a little bit (even though it wasn’t my recipe) and say that Betsy reported these guys were the first thing to sell out at the bake sale and they were gone in about 20 minutes!  How’s that for market research?!

If you’re looking for a solid dessert to make for a party this weekend and don’t feel like making your own gummy worms, these guys are surefire winners.