Raspberry Cinnamon Cupcakes

Yesterday I taught my first ever math lesson! It was amazing! I made this great Presidents Day math activity for the 7th grade class that I am observing.  It was the perfect activity since it combined graphing with facts about the Presidents.  I adapted the lesson that I found via twitter and sent it to my cooperating teacher to see what she thought.  She loved it! I walked into the class on Presidents Day and she came up to me and said, "So, do you want to lead the activity?"  I eagerly said yes and then proceeded to feel super nervous.  I spent the first period trying to think of what I was going to do, how I was going to talk, how I was going to stand, would I get students to read out loud or work in groups, and so on.  I was shocked at how much thought goes into simply standing and presenting an activity to a class.


Becoming a teacher has been my dream and ambition since and early age.  The fact that I finally arrived at the point in my life where I can actually get up in front of a class and teach is amazing to me.  Yesterday was a dream come true.

The students loved the activity.  They started by predicting the President's salary and were amazed that baseball players who don't even get to play made more than the president.  It was really fun to watch them debate.  Then, they moved on with the activity and spent the time graphing how the President's salary has changed over time.  They had to identify the independent and dependent variables and then graph the data.  They then learned about the concept of a step graph.  For homework, they had to look at the equation for finding what the past salaries would be in today's money.  Then they computed these results.  The kids were enthusiastic and completed a lot of the assignment all on their own in class.  I was so excited to see them having a good time and grasping the concepts.  I can't wait to spend more time teaching and getting  used to being in the front of the classroom.

This experience has put me in such a great mood and that usually means I feel like making something delicious and sharing it with friends.  I have the traditional study night this week and I decided that I would break out my shiny new cupcake corer to celebrate all the good stuff going on in my life.  I found a great recipe for Strawberry Stuffed Cinnamon Cupcakes and decided to adapt it a little and make it with Raspberry Jam instead.

Raspberry Cinnamon Cupcakes (inspired by Scientifically Sweet)

oven-ready

all done :)

perfect!

look at that cupcake corer go!

Filled with raspberry jam

Raspberry Cinnamon Cupcake

Ingredients:
For the Cupcakes:
3 cups flour
1 1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
2 cups minus 4 tbsp sugar
1/2 cup unsalted butter
2 eggs
1/2 cup plus 2 tbsp sour cream
4 tbsp canola oil
2 tsp vanilla
2/3 cup milk
For the Filling: 
about 2 cups raspberry seedless jam
For the Frosting:
8 oz low-fat cream cheese
8 tbsp unsalted butter
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp vanilla
2 cups powdered sugar
1-2 tsp milk

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 and spray cupcake pan.  This recipe will make about 24-30 cupcakes.
2. In a large bowl, whisk flour, cinnamon, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.  Using your mixer, slowly mix in the sugar until well combined.  Next, mix in the softened butter and beat for about 2 minutes or until you have a mixture the consistency of fine, moist crumbs.
3. In a medium bowl, whisk the eggs, sour cream, canola oil, and vanilla.  Slowly add this to the dry mixture and beat until combined.  Slowly pour in the milk and beat until just combined.
4.  Fill the cupcake pans until each cup is just 1/2 full.  Bake for about 20 minutes or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean.
5.  Let cool completely.  Once cool, using the cupcake corer, or a knife, core the cupcakes and fill with about a tsp of jam.
6.  Make the frosting: beat the butter and cream cheese until well combined.  Beat in the cinnamon and sugar.  Slowly add the sugar until well combined. Add 2-4 tsp of milk until you have the desired consistency.  Frost the cupcakes :)
Enjoy :)

Cinnamon Mug Cake

What do you do when you have too much batter?

Well, some people, patient people, would wait for the cupcakes that are taking up all the pan space to finish, cool, and then make more cupcakes with the rest of the batter.  Those people are not me and I was not patient.  I made Raspberry Cinnamon Cupcakes and after I filled 24 wells, I still had some leftover batter.  So, I found an oven-proof mug and poured the rest of the batter in.

The result: probably one of the best things I have ever accidentally made.

Hot chocolate?...nope! Steaming  mug of cinnamon cake with cinnamon cream cheese frosting!

The Glee finally was on tonight and every Tuesday a few of the girls in my house all get together and watch glee.  I always bake before this to be ready for study night on Wednesday.

Glorious oven safe mug

Tonight, I was downstairs baking for study night and having a grand time.  Kim helped me out and what ensued was a mix of baking/dance party/photography workshop.  It was awesome.  We had so much fun and I think that this provided the base for our spontaneous creativity.  And thus, the mug cake.  We found the mug on the shelf and had to scrape off the sticker on the bottom.  Waiting to see those beautiful letters: "Oven-Safe" was one of the longest waits of my life.  Slowly we peeled back the sticker: Oven-S...A...F...E!!!!  We immediately plopped the rest of that batter into the mug and stuck it in the oven with the rest of the cupcakes.  No waiting for one batch to finish and cool, everything got baked in one take.  The mug was perfect! We had to leave it in for an extra 10-15 minutes compared to the cupcakes.  Then we dumped some cinnamon cream cheese frosting on top, grabbed three forks (Juliana showed up by then) and went upstairs to watch Glee.

Perfection!

I don't want to spoil anything for those of you who are waiting to watch Glee on Hulu or some other site, but this episode was epic! It was the winter finale and that mug cake was the perfect way to celebrate.  Such a great night: friends, glee, and cake!

Check out the recipe for the cinnamon cupcake batter here!

Enjoy :)

Liebster!

I've been Liebstered by The Posh Latin Cook, thanks Elena! This is an award for beloved new blogs. 

The Liebster Award originated from Germany and it means, "Dearest, Beloved, Favorite."

Here are the rules:

1. Show thanks to the blogger by linking back to his/her blog.

2. Pick 5 blogs with less than 200 followers and let them know about your nomination by leaving a comment on their blog.

3. Post the award on your blog!

My nominations:

1. A Dash of Megnut

2. Badger Girl Learns to Cook

3. Is Butter a Carb?

4. Quest for Delish

5. The Healthy Bites

Check these guys out!

Oatmeal Fudge Bars

I just love oatmeal in my baked goods and this recipe that I found on Erin's Food Files was just too great to pass up!  I love the easy factor of making bars instead of cookies and I love the fact that it's not just chocolate chips, but fudge!  Tonight I have study night, which I always bake for, but since yesterday was Valentine's Day I did not have time to bake! Uh oh! So today between middle school this morning, class this afternoon, and study night/dance rehearsal/composite pictures for my fraternity tonight I had to bake.  Bars seemed like a great idea with all this shenanigans going on.

These bars were super easy to make and took no time at all.  I had them all prepped and ready to go into the oven within 30 minutes and then they only took 30 minutes to bake.  That gave me plenty of time to do the dishes and even get some reading done for my classes!  I hope you enjoy this recipe:

Oatmeal Fudge Bars (inspired by Erin's Food Files)

Ingredients:
For the cookie part:
2 1/2 cups flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 cup butter
2 cups brown sugar
2 eggs
2 tsp vanilla
For the fudge filling:
2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 15 oz can sweetened condensed milk
2 tbsp butter
1 tsp salt
2 1/2 tsp vanilla

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees and grease or flour a 9 x 13 inch pan.
2. Whisk together flour, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon in a medium sized bowl and set aside.
3. In a large bowl, beat butter with sugar until light and fluffy.  Beat in eggs one at a time until well combined.  Mix in vanilla.

4. Slowly add the flour mixture to the wet ingredients until just combined.  Mix in the oats.

5. Press about 2/3 of the cookie dough evenly along the bottom of the pan.

6. Make the filling: Over medium to low heat, melt the chocolate, milk, butter, and salt, stirring constantly until smooth.  Remove from heat and stir in the vanilla.  Pour mixture over the cookie dough in the pan and spread out evenly.  Make sure the the chocolate is not touching the sides of the pan as it might stick.

7. Sprinkle the remaining cookie dough on top of the fudge layer.  Bake for about 30-35 minutes, until the topping is light brown and the fudge layer is firm, but not set.

Enjoy :)