You Put the Lime in the Coconut...

Ok well that's not the most accurate title, but I wanted something witty that involved coconuts. My other option was Raspberry Beret (which you'll understand more after seeing the pictures of the cupcakes), but I figured that wouldn't be quite as well received seeing as I might be the only person who thoroughly enjoys singing along to Prince songs whenever I hear them on the radio. Anyway as you can gather from the title or this post, I decided to pick up my baking and made coconut cupcakes! For those of you in the Orlando area, there is an absolutely phenomenal barbecue place that opened up called Four Rivers (check out the link to the website, it's legitimately phenomenal).  In addition to their amazing bbq, my mom and I always indulge in a slice of their heavenly (and HUGE) coconut cake. Now I never was much of a coconut fan (it was something about the texture of shredded coconut that turned me off), but this cake converted me. It set the bar high for what I was expecting out of a coconut cupcake, and I was nervous to see if I was able to accomplish my task. I found a Barefoot Contessa recipe on the Food Network website that seemed decent enough (I never used to be too fond of Ina Garten...she always seemed too pretentious for me to enjoy watching her show, but this recipe had a five star rating from over 250 users so I figured I'd give it a shot).
I made the batter following my own rules on how much shredded coconut, vanilla, and almond extract to add (lighter on the shredded coconut (texture remember) and heavier on the extracts), and went to fill my tins. I was using these really cute cupcakes liners that I got at Michaels (since the cupcakes themselves weren't going to have much color), and I guess I got distracted by their bright colors because I once again over-filled the liners with batter. After ten minutes in the oven I checked on the cupcakes only to be greeted by mutant muffin tops. As I lamented my lack of skill, my mom told me that she likes the cupcakes having muffin tops which made me feel slightly (only slightly...I still needed pretty ones to photograph) better. I took the cupcakes out of the oven while we were eating dinner (stuffed porkchops...yay mom!) and proceeded to let them cool. The icing was up next, and the recipe that went along with the cake recipe was for a coconut cream cheese icing. I made it once again being heavy handed on the vanilla and almond extracts for some added flavor. I iced a few with the regular icing and then for my coconut crazed older brother and mom, mixed the remaining shredded coconut in with the leftover icing and gave the rest of the cupcakes the royal coconut treatment. For a splash of color (look how fancy I am...a splash!), I decided to top the photo worthy cupcakes with some toasted coconut and a raspberry (hence raspberry beret...SO witty!). The finished result can be seen below!

The cupcakes were well received by my family, but I really don't think they were quite up to snuff. I still have the taste of Four River's coconut cake on my taste buds, so I'll be trying this one another time. Some improvements that I'm thinking of making: using a more moist yellow cake with slight flavoring as opposed to the dryer cake that this recipe produced (which could have been a result of adding cake flour due to a lack of enough all purpose flour to fulfill the recipe) and  making more of a straight up whipped frosting with flavoring instead of the cream cheese icing (the cream cheese was definitely an over powering flavor compared to the coconut taste). Over all it was a success for a coconut cupcake it just wasn't quite THE coconut cupcake that I was looking for.
Lastly, an update on Gus: My mom took him to the vet yesterday for one of his standard puppy check ups, and he now weighs a whopping (drum roll please) 35 pounds!! Well actually it's 35.something according to my mom, but she couldn't remember the other number. He's going to be quite the big boy which saddens me because the day is fast approaching when I can no longer carry him around like my little baby :( That's all from me for now! Stay tuned as I hopefully attempt to conquer Arnold Palmer (yes you read that right!) mini cupcakes for the fourth of July! Have a safe and happy holiday weekend!!