Archi’s NEW Yearly Challenge

So, the truth of the matter is that last year’s challenge, was a bit too ambitious for me. I gave up on blogging pretty early in, and gave up on the challenge not soon after.

However, the week’s I stayed strong with the challenge, gave me new skills and techniques and definitely made me a better cook/baker. I learned to fully appreciate meals when out, especially ones that were pretty complicated to remake; but for the most part, i’ve come to realize I prefer making great meals myself as opposed to going out.

In everything I’ve made, or recreated for myself for the sake of the challenge, only one meal stands out as NOT better than restaurant quality, that being Channa Masala; which I also realized I don’t like in large quantities. Apart from that everything else, I’ve made has been a success!

So, I have been thinking what is a reasonable challenge for me this year (and yes I realize it’s nearly half over) and have finally decided on something. So, one thing I take away from this challenge, is that I enjoy challenges; and especially enjoy ambitious cooking/baking challenges. Something about the “Go big or don’t bother” aspect; which made successes feel much more gratifying and failures being something to learn from. On average this year, I’ve been making at least 1-3 ambitious meals per week; for work, personal and social purposes; so my challenge this year will be to continue with my ambitious meal making and to blog about them at least once every 2 weeks.

That being said, look to the next post for my most recent undertakings.

Cupcakes galore

So, its been a while since I’ve updated my yearly challenge. But, I am still going strong (kind of), and experimenting with different creations. Most recently, I have been inspired by a novel about making cupcakes.

Amazon recommended the book to me, shortly after I had discovered Baking Cakes in Kigali, called The Icing on The Cupcake. Now, this book was an infinitely lighter read than Baking Cakes in Kigali, but still very entertaining. It’s your basic chick-lit book, about a spoiled heroine starting over and realizing the folly of her ways, in the meantime using baking as therapy. The last bit is what drew me in, the added bonus was that each chapter of this book ended with a recipe for cupcakes, and after trying the first one, that I was able to view with amazon reader, it became clear to me that I needed to purchase this book. Shortly after purchasing this book and trying some of its creations, I found out that the website, and food blog of the author was up and running, where she had posted most of the recipes found in her book. However, I am still pleased with my purchase, and have started lending the book out to my fellow baking comrades.

Meanwhile, after an unplanned situation with my other job (my not day job), I found myself with the house to myself, with many melancholy moments, requiring what else, but some therapeutic baking. I was actually considering treating myself by going to one of the few good cupcake cafes in Toronto (most located on the east end of the city, which is at least a 1.5 hour commute for me), but then decided I’d try my hand at making one of the more unique options myself. The result: Earl Grey Cupcakes with Lemon Buttercream frosting. These turned out AMAZING! I used a decaf Earl Grey, actually I just cut open a Tetley bag (which I’ve never done before). I halved both the cupcake recipe and the icing. The icing turned out really well, I had my doubts but in the end it was smooth and creamy, and with just enough icing sugar to make it slightly harden without making it rock hard like royal icing. I definitely recommend trying this recipe, the cupcakes themselves are really light, and the lemon icing is a great compliment (though the lemon zest and juice combo makes for a pretty flavourful icing, so it might overpower the subtlety of the cupcakes.

There is so much more that I could say about cupcakes but then I’d never finish this blog post, and its been sitting in my draft folder for almost a year, so I’m just going to save my further thoughts and post this as is.