(award winning) SALTED CARAMEL CHOCOLATE CUPCAKES

No, I'm not lying, they really are award winning!

I mean, sure, it's not some fancy culinary award, but still. I work at a super great place- and for it's 50th anniversary as a company they held a version of Cupcake Wars. I entered this recipe and won one of the three awards. Boom. 

These cupcakes are insanely rich and sweet- with just the perfect amount of salt. The sour cream makes them extra-dense, and the salted caramel filling keeps them from drying out. Gahh. So good.

What you'll need to make it happen:

Cupcake:

This recipe is one I've made a ton of times, and it's a version of Martha Stewart's basic chocolate cupcakes (click for recipe). The only things I change is add an extra teaspoon of vanilla extract & a little extra sour cream!

Salted Caramel Sauce:

Oh, you missed the recipe? I just shared it on the blog recently!

You can find the recipe HERE

Caramel Frosting:

2 cups powdered sugar

1 stick unsalted butter

1/2 cup salted caramel sauce

1. Cube room temperature butter and beat in mixer for 3 minutes, or until light and fluffy.

2. Add in your sugar, mixing lightly to keep contained. Once well mixed, add in caramel sauce and beat for another 4 minutes or so until light and fluffy!

3. Refrigerate your frosting until you're ready to use it. Just leave out to get to room temp and you'll be good to go!

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Tips for the cupcakes, now that you have the recipes:

1. Unless you have a fancy frosting set, all you need is a glass, a ziplock bag, and a scissors! Insert the bag into your glass, folding the edges over & filling the bag. 

2. An easy way to hollow out the center of cupcakes for filling is to take a sharp paring knife, and cut out a square in the center of the cake. Fill with caramel sauce and top with frosting!

3. This caramel sauce is too good just to fill the cupcakes with, drizzle it on top too, and cover with sprinkles!

 The finished product:

 And of course, the best part of the cupcake is when you cut it open and all the salted caramel ooooozes out:

So what are you waiting for? I mean, they're award winning people! Get to it!

What cupcake would be your award winner?

Share away so I can try them for myself!

xo, lp

Love cupcakes? Try out my chocolate peanut butter cupcakes or my rainbow cupcakes!

For instagram fabulousness, go here!

SALTED CARAMEL SAUCE. (it's as good as it sounds)

 If you're reading this as work- this is one of those recipes that is going to make you HATE ME.

Especially if you're on a summer diet/ doing whole30 / aren't able to immediately go home an make 10 batches of this.

This salted caramel sauce is good on anything. Ice cream, cupcakes, pie, apple slices, or hell- just all by itself. It's pretty easy to make and fairly difficult to mess up, so make some, keep it in your fridge at all times, and thank me later.

What you'll need to make it happen:

1 cup granulated sugar

1/4 cup water- room temperature

1/2 cup heavy whipping cream

1 stick unsalted OR salted butter

1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract

either:

two pinches kosher or sea salt

OR  1/4 teaspoon iodized salt.

How to make it happen:

- as i've mentioned before- when working with caramel you do have to pay attention. so set aside your phone/computer/iPad/mirror for 15 minutes and make this correctly the first time, ya dig?-

1. Combine your water and sugar in a heavy bottom sauce pan and stir to combine. It'll seem too thick- it's not!

2. Place the pan over medium heat so the sugar begins to slowly dissolve. This will take about 5 minutes. Resist your urge to stir it constantly and only give the pan a swirl every minute or so. 

3. Slowly raise the heat a notch at a time to medium high, lightly swirling the pan every minute or so for 7 minutes. Keep a close eye on it after the 5th minute or so- you'll want to get your butter ready to put in once the mixture is a LIGHT amber color. Too dark and it'll burn! 

4. Cube your room temp butter and add it to the sugar mixture- it'll sizzle a bit because well.. you're adding something cooler to a really hot liquid. Don't worry! It should happen that way! Stir the mixture VERY carefully, partially incorporating the butter. Be super careful not to whip the mixture up on the sides of the pan, or the sugar will crystalize, get back in your mixture, and ruin the whole batch. Sadness.

5. Once melted, take your pan off the heat and add your vanilla and heavy cream. Using a whisk, LIGHTLY stir it until it is a cohesive, very liquid caramel. Pour quickly into a clean pan or bowl to avoid any of the uncooked sugar. 

6. In the new bowl, whisk in your salt, taste- add more if you'd like! Put it aside to cool for a bit. (yes, you're allowed to go back on instagram at this point in the process. snap a pic and tag me, @lpodlich so I can see your sweet caramel!)

7. After this, keep it refrigerated .. or eat it all in one sitting. It'll yield about 1 1/2 cups- so plenty for you and your favorite friends.

 SO good while still warm on ice cream!

 It's messy- but worth it!

 This will totally be my new go-to little gift to bring to dinner parties, or other get togethers!

Throw it in a cute mason jar with twine and a sweet tag and you'll be everyone's favorite for sure :)

What would you slather this caramel on?

I highly recommend chocolate ice cream. Just sayin'

xo, lp

toasted coconut caramel bars

Oh hey.

I haven't done a recipe post in a while since we've been traveling, and this is technically a cheater post since I made this recipe before we left Virginia. I started baking through everything in our pantry, and after finding a bag of coconut I knew I needed to make some knock-off Samoa type bars. I've made Pillsbury Carmelitas bars before (recipe below), and decided to make something like them using coconut. I can't take full credit for these- they're a recipe I made with a mix of the three below:

This recipe from Martha Stewart  //  This recipe from Pillsbury  //  This recipe from King Arthur Flour

What you'll need to make it happen:

1 1/4 cup flour

1 1/3 cup brown sugar

2 cups shredded coconut (toasted)

6 tablespoons butter

1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1 large egg

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

8 oz caramel sundae sauce

1/2- 3/4 cup semi sweet chocolate chips

parchment paper

How to make it happen:

Step 1: Toast your coconut. This isn't rocket science- but if you don't pay attention, it will burn, and then you'll be super annoyed...so pay attention. Spread your coconut onto a baking sheet and begin toasting for 10 minutes at 300 degrees. Pull out, stir around, and toast for another 20 minutes. You'll see the edges will start getting dark quickly, so either scrape them off the pan early or stir them in to the middle. Set aside 1/2 cup of the coconut for later topping.

Step 2: Turn up your oven to 375. While you're waiting for it to heat up  mix your flour, baking powder, salt, and 1 1/2 cups of toasted coconut together and set aside. 

Step 3: Beat your butter and sugar together until well mixed and add your egg and vanilla. Once well mixed, and in your coconut/flour mixture. 

Step 4: Line a 9 x 13 pan with parchment paper (this will make the bars a breeze to pull out) and spread your mixture evenly in the pan. Bake for 12 minutes, or until golden brown, depending on how hot your oven runs. 

Step 5: Remove pan from oven, and while still hot drizzle 6 ounces of your caramel sauce over the baked base, and put back in the oven to cook for another 15 minutes. Your caramel should be crazy bubbling when you pull them out!

Step 6: Let the base & caramel cool for a few minutes before sprinkling your chocolate chips evenly, spreading as they start to soften. Let cool until chocolate hardens.

Step 7: Once your chocolate is cool, drizzle the remaining 2 ounces of your caramel sauce over the bars and sprinkle your remaining coconut so it adheres to the caramel. 

Step 8: Let your bars cool completely before pulling up on the sides of the parchment paper to remove. Either using a very sharp greased knife or pizza cutter, slice bars into squares. These babies are RICH, so cut into fairly small squares!

I recommend keeping the bars in the fridge, mainly because in the summer they'll just melt all over- but also because they're delicious cold!

Any favorite bar recipes you have? 

If they're anything like these, I know I'd like them...

xo, lp

pssssssssssst: thanks for all the well wishes on our trip! we're currently back in wisconsin, getting our lives all straightened up before leaving for a 5 day camping extravaganza. expect plenty of excited madison tweets/pictures....