Cooking with Coveiter

I was recently asked if I'd be interested in creating a baked good in the spirit of the Coveiter website, which provides daily helpings of all things pretty--shoes, clothes, home items, and jewelry to name a few. Being a huge Coveiter fan, I didn't have to think twice before enthusiastically saying "YES!" (More excuses to bake, right?) Whether you're a girly girl or just someone who appreciates beautiful things, you should check out their awesome website. The ladies at Coveiter have impeccable taste and have never been known to disappoint. Many, many thanks go out to Lindsey at Coveiter, who agreed to photograph my creation. Beautiful work, Lindsey!

For this project I used the colors of Coveiter's blog heading for inspiration: a palette of purple, grey (silver?), and white. Purple was easy--I knew I had to incorporate blueberries somewhere in my recipe (and I knew it had to be cupcakes!), since they bake up and burst into a vivid shade of purple. In the end I chose to use them in the frosting in order to better showcase their lovely hue. Baked in silver foil liners and topped with a pearl-dusted white fondant flower, I think I did a good job with sticking to my planned color scheme. I better be careful, though, since lately the famous Sprinkles Bakery is having a fit over other people allegedly copying "their look" with fondant decorations on top of cupcakes. :)


A Dozen Donut Cupakes (adapted from The Joy of Cooking)

2 cups unbleached flour
1 Tbl. baking powder

1/2 tsp. baking soda

1/2 tsp. salt

1 tsp. ground cinnamon

1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg

2 large eggs

1 cup vanilla yogurt

2/3 cup packed brown sugar

1/4 cup canola oil
1 tsp. vanilla extract

Place oven rack in middle position and preheat oven to 400°F. Line a 12-cup muffin pan with paper or foil cups.

Whisk dry ingredients together in a medium bowl. In a separate (large) bowl whisk eggs, yogurt, brown sugar, oil, and vanilla together until smooth. Add dry ingredients and stir just until moistened. Batter will be lumpy.

Portion into 12 muffin cups and bake until cakes test done, about 15 minutes. Let cool in muffin pan for 5 minutes, then remove to wire racks to cool completely before frosting.



Dreamy Blueberry Buttercream (enough to frost 24 cupcakes)

1/2 cup butter, softened

1/2 cup Crisco®

1/4 cup Blueberry Cobbler flavored Coffee Mate® powdered creamer

3 1/2 cups powdered sugar
1 small can wild blueberries, drained**

**Buy a box of Betty Crocker® "Twice the Blueberries" muffin mix. It comes with two small cans of wild blueberries...borrow one for this recipe, and you'll still have one can left to make blueberry muffins with. Yay! Or you could buy frozen wild blueberries and use about 1/4 cup if you live in an area where this is more cost effective, or go with fresh if you're lucky enough to get your hands on some.

With an electric mixer, cream butter and shortening together until smooth and creamy. Add powdered coffee creamer and mix to incorporate. Slowly add powdered sugar, stopping to scrape bowl as needed, and beat another 3-5 minutes. Add blueberries and continue beating another minute or so, until berries break down and blend into frosting.