Growing up I often asked for a Red Velvet cake for my birthday. One year I remember Mom making a version with peppermint icing, with a recipe I think came from Southern Living. I decided to try something like that, but in miniature form, adapting the recipe Mom always used for red velvet cake, which I think came from my grandmother. I entered these cupcakes in the “Biochemistry Bake-Off” at work a couple years ago, when we first started this blog.  It’s become one of the most popular posts on the site, especially this time of year, but the photos were long past due for a remake — we’ve come a long way since then — and my birthday yesterday was the perfect excuse to make myself cupcakes.

My favorite part of Red Velvet cake is the cream cheese frosting, so I stuck with that for this festive version, but flavored it with peppermint.  I garnished some with a bit of peppermint bark (yes, I know I need to update that post as well…), and some of them I frosted with a candy cane swirl. To get the swirl effect, dye some of the frosting red with food coloring (it will take a lot!) and carefully fill one side of a pastry bag with the red frosting and the other side with white. Then, when you pipe it out of a star tip, you get a striped swirl.

You might also like:

• Red Velvet Cake Truffles
• Mocha Peppermint Bark Cookies
• Peppermint Bark
• Nutty Fingers

Peppermint Red Velvet Cupcakes
Makes 2 dozen cupcakes, or use the same recipe for a 3 layer cake.
Note that I never seem to get a nice domed top out of these cupcakes, but once you frost them it’s not a big deal, and the cake still tastes delicious.

For the cake:

1 c butter (softened)
2 c sugar
2 eggs (room temperature)
1 T cocoa
1 T vinegar
2 1/2 c cake flour
1/2 t salt
1/2 t baking soda
1 c buttermilk
1 t vanilla
1 oz red food coloring

Preheat oven to 350 F.

Cream butter and sugar. Add eggs and beat until fluffy.

Add cocoa to vinegar, and add to creamed mixture.

Sift remaining dry ingredients and gradually add to batter. Add buttermilk, vanilla, and food coloring.

Bake in cupcake wrappers (makes 2 dozen) or bake in three greased and floured 9″ round cake pans, at 350 F for 25 minutes.

Let cool completely before icing.

Peppermint Cream Cheese Frosting:

3/4 package of cream cheese (6 oz) (softened)
1/2 cup butter (softened)
1 1-lb. box of powdered sugar
1 t peppermint extract

Beat cream cheese and butter. Gradually add sugar, beating until smooth. Add extract and beat until blended.

As I said before, I’ve been dying to make peppermint bark cookies, inspired by 101cookbooks. I’m also continuing to search for the perfect double chocolate cookie. These Double-Chocolate Espresso Cookies from Cheryl St. John’s blog seemed worth trying, so I made them with chopped peppermint bark instead of the chocolate chips (the ones added whole; I still used semisweet for the ones melted at the beginning of the recipe). I also used 1 tsp of espresso instead of 1 T of instant coffee, since I didn’t want to buy instant coffee.

They turned out pretty well. The cookies are pretty chewy and brownie like, and very rich. They were delicious, but I’m still going for something chewy in the middle like that but a little crispy on the edges and top. Also, I wanted them to be a little bit more peppermint-y. Next time I’ll add a few drops of peppermint extract. I garnished them with little bits of chopped peppermint bark, but they were too small, so they don’t really give a hint to the cookie’s contents like I wanted. Next time, I’ll reserve some of the peppermint bark and press in a few larger pieces into each cookie before baking. The peppermint bark is a little unusual in a cookie, and I liked the way it turned out a lot. The candy cane pieces add a pleasant chewy-crunch, adding more texture than a normal cookie. These are definitely something I will make again.

You might also like:

• Nutty Fingers
• Pecan Toffee
• Date Rock Cookies
• Peppermint Bark
• Christmas Cookies

Matt and I bought a Christmas tree this weekend, and I decorated it last night, so I seem to have gotten in my holiday mood early this year. So of course I wanted to bake something festive. Inspired by an old recipe from Heidi of 101cookbooks, I decided to make some chocolate peppermint bark cookies. Not wanting to pay $20 a pound for peppermint bark, I first had to make my own. Here’s my “recipe”, though you can barely call it that. Next time, I think I’ll change the ratio to have a little more semisweet chocolate than white, and add a few drops of peppermint extract to the white chocolate.

You might also like:

• Nutty Fingers
• Pecan Toffee
• Date Rock Cookies
• Mocha Peppermint Bark Cookies
• Christmas Cookies

Peppermint Bark

Ingredients:
12 oz semisweet chocolate
12 oz white chocolate chips
6 peppermint candy canes or about 25 (I’m guessing) peppermint candies

Instructions:

First line a jelly roll pan with parchment paper.

Melt the semisweet chocolate. I used a double boiler, but mostly just because I wanted to take a picture of something melting that hopefully will eventually be added to the header here. The microwave (on low heat) would work fine too. Spread the melted chocolate in the jelly roll pan. I didn’t want it too thin, so mine just covered about 3/4 of the bottom of the pan. Place in the fridge to harden. I left it in the fridge for about 15 minutes, and it felt hard, but kind of made a mess in the next step, so I’d probably recommend leaving it at least 25 minutes or so, so it can get really cold. It might even be good to put it in the freezer at the end for a couple minutes, though not long enough to really get frozen or the chocolate might get that white film on it that frozen chocolate gets.

While you’re waiting for the semisweet chocolate to harden, crush the candy canes. I didn’t find a great way to do this — they poked holes in my plastic bag when I tried to crush them in a bag, so then I tried the food processor which grated the already small pieces really small but didn’t do much for the big ones. Overall, I think a heavy duty plastic bag is probably the best option, and next time I’ll probably use the smaller peppermint candies instead of candy canes. Then melt the white chocolate. Spread the white chocolate on top of the semisweet chocolate. This is where I got into trouble — the white chocolate melted the semisweet, so they got a little swirled together when I tried to spread it. You can’t really tell with the peppermint pieces on top though, and it doesn’t much matter anyway.

While the white chocolate is still hot, sprinkle the peppermint pieces over the top. I then used a piece of parchment paper to very gently press in the peppermint pieces. Put back in the fridge. When good and hard, break into pieces.

We’ll see tomorrow how the cookies go!