Saturday, October 23, 2010

Plethora of Pears

This fall, we had an over abundance of pears. We literally couldn't give them away fast enough or think of enough uses for them. Many sadly went to waste. Well, not complete waste. They went to the compost heap to be later reintroduced back into the earth.
I was craving cupcakes desperately bad a few weeks back. I'd been looking at this massive bowl of pears racking my brain for some way to use them that would not involve canning. Not only do I not have the containers for canning, I'm lazy.

It finally hit... Pear Spice Cupcakes. My mom used to make spice cake when I was a kid. It was one of the few times she would work in the kitchen without something going terribly awry. You know it's true, Mom, so minimize those protests. How do you make mashed potatoes again?

Whoops, that's not the trail we want. Where was I?

Ah, yes. Surely it would not be that difficult to manipulate a spice cake recipe to get a delightful pear flavor I was looking for. I did this recipe as cupcakes, but you can just as easily do this up as a full fledged Autumnal Tribute cake.
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Pear Spice Cupcakes
1-1/2 Cups Pureed Pear (approximately 3-4 average size pears)
1/2 Cup of Butter
2-1/2 Cups of Purpose Flour
1-1/2 Cups of  Sugar
2 Eggs
1/4 teaspoon Baking Powder
1-1/2 teaspoon Baking Soda
1-1/2 teaspoon Salt
1 teaspoon Cinnamon
1/2 Cup of Water
A couple shakes each of ground nutmeg, ground cloves, and ground ginger

I started off with peeling the pears before cutting them lengthwise. I've seen suggestions to use a melon baller to remove the core and seeds, but I have metal measuring spoons that work this just fine in the same way. I then quartered the pears and tossed them in the blender for pureeing, until there were no chunks.
In my Kitchen Aid stand mixer, I creamed the butter and sugar together. In a seperate bowl add your dry ingredients and mix them together well. Mix the eggs in with the sugar. Gradually add the water and pureed pear to the sugar mixture until thouroughly mixed. Then gradually add the flour mixture to the mixer until all the ingredients have come together.
Fill muffin cupcake liners in cupcake pan 2/3 of the way with the cake batter. Bake for approxiametly 18-20 minutes in an oven pre-heated to 340 degrees fahrenheit. Makes about 24 cupcakes. Allow to cool before frosting.

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*Note: Cupcakes imaged above were not frosted with this icing, but I have since determined this to be a far superior compliment than regular cream cheese frosting.
Maple Cream Cheese Frosting
1 Cup of Butter, softened
3 Ounces of  Cream Cheese, softned
2/3 Cup of Brown Sugar
1/4 teaspoon Salt
3/4 Cup of Maple Syrup (preferably real)
3/4 teaspoon of Vanilla Extract
1 Cup of Powdered Sugar
In a stand mixer beat sugar, butter, cream cheese, and salt together until fluffy. Gradually add the maple syrup and vanilla extract. Slowly add the powdered sugar until fully intgrated and fluffy.
Frost to your heart's content.

3 comments:

  1. Oooh, I will be back to this blog more often! You are speaking my language! :)

    Re: Buzz Lightyear, yes, I was expecting a million kiddos with the same costume! But I didn't see any at all in our neighborhood. We are more of a mature "Iron Man" subdivision, I guess. *shrug* Hope you had a fun Halloween with your kiddos. Can you get them all to coordinate? Like go as The Bangles or something? Oh wait, I think there were only three Bangles. Nevermind.

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  2. these look tasty!!! thanks for the comment :)

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