Mojito Cupcakes !

Mojito Cupcakes!

Winter is coming...in Westeros. Here is Spring looking forward to Summer so, in order to welcome Winter in Westeros the way to go is...to celebrate! Mojitos to say good-bye to the 6 season long Summer and get ready for Winter. Honestly I can't even imagine that the Night King (ugly as hell) would say no to a fantastic and heavily rum loaded Mojito Cupcake. If John and his ban are smart, they should be baking like crazy: lots of mouths to feed BUT, I guarantee that after four or five of these each...they will gladly stay in Summer land and ditch the ugly king. I would.

The wife eat all the Margarita Cookies and wanted more, so to make a small change I modified Lawren Moneta's recipe and the end result was fantastic. She suggested a meringue-butter topping but I am not crazy about meringue and even less would be the current wife once she takes one to work every morning. I substituted with a butter topping with rum and honestly is absolutely great.

So, at the end of the day, sure, Winter is coming but while that happens let's have a mojito cupcake eating contest and see who wants to play "let's memorize the huge title of Khaleesi: the Queen of Meereen, Queen of Andals, the Rhoynar Rhoynar and the First Men, Lady Regnant to the Seven Kingdoms, Protector of the Realm, Khaleesi of the Great Sea, Breaker of Chains and Mother of Dragons (they should add "the Queen of dramatic entrances and the Queen of flammable clothing".

Mojito Cupcakes  

Cooking Time: 120 Minutes   Makes 12 servings

Ingredients

CUPCAKES

1⁄2 Cup (125 ml) whole milk

 1⁄2 Cup+2tbsp(125ml+30ml) packed fresh mint leaves, divided, plus extra for garnish

 11⁄2 Cups (375 ml) all-purpose flour

11⁄2 Tsp (7 ml) baking powder

1⁄4 Tsp (1 ml) salt

1⁄2 Cup (125 ml) unsalted butter, at room temperature

1 Cup + 1 tbsp (265 ml) granulated sugar, divided

2 Large eggs

2 Limes, zested and juiced, plus extra lime slices for garnish

6 oz (125 ml) rum, divided (4 oz and 2 oz)

1⁄2 Tsp (2 ml) vanilla extract

- thin lime wedges and fresh mint, for garnish

RUM BUTTERCREAM

175 g Unsalted butter, room temperature

400 g Icing Sugar

1 oz Rum

Baking Instructions

1. In a small saucepan, stir together the milk and the 1⁄2 cup of the fresh mint leaves (extract won’t work!) over medium heat. Warm until steaming, remove from heat, cover and let steep for 30 minutes.
2. Strain through a  fine- meshed sieve into a small bowl, pressing on mint leaves to extract  flavored milk. Discard mint and set milk aside to cool.

3.  Preheat oven to 325˚F . Line 2 standard-sized muffin tins with paper liners and set aside.

4. In a medium-sized bowl, whisk together  four, baking powder and salt.

5. In bowl of a stand mixer  fitted with paddle attachment, beat together butter and 1 cup (250 ml) sugar on medium-high speed until smooth, about 4 minutes. 

6. Add eggs, one at a time, mixing to combine after each one.

7. Beat in lime zest and juice, rum and vanilla extract until thoroughly incorporated. Add  flour mixture in three batches, alternating with  flavored milk in two batches.

8. Mix just until incorporated. Using a rubber spatula, give batter one last stir. Divide batter evenly among prepared muffin cups. 

9. Bake, rotating pans after 12 minutes, until cakes spring back when touched and a wooden skewer inserted only has a few moist crumbs attached, about 25 minutes total.

10. While cupcakes bake, we are going to prepare the syrup, so combine the remaining 2 oz of rum, 2 tbsp of the mint and 1 tbsp of sugar in a small saucepan and warm over medium heat until sugar has melted and mixture is just warm, about 8 minutes. Remove pan from heat, cover and let steep.

11. Carefully remove cooked cupcakes from muffin tins and allow to cool

on a wire rack for 8 minutes. Brush top of cupcakes with infused rum syrup and allow to cool completely.

12. While cupcakes cool, let’s make the Rum Buttercream.

13. On your mixer bowl combine the room temperature butter with the icing sugar and mix for about 6 minutes until the mix is smooth and you can’t feel the sugar in your mouth, then add the rum and mix for another 2 minutes. You should have a very soft and runny butter mix. That is what we are looking for.

14. Using a bag pipe, decorate the top of the muffins and garnish with a fresh mint leaf and a thin lime slice (I didn’t do that as limes are so expensive and the lime slices will go to waste, but is up to you!)

15. Put in the fridge for an hour so the butter gets harder. Then serve and…

16. Enjoy!