ICE: Coffee

For my Iron Cupcake Earth: Coffee entry I made an almond-coffee cupcake with vanilla buttercream and coffee toffee. They ended up being nice cupcakes, though I'd up the coffee next time.

I used Michael Chu's toffee recipe on Cooking for Engineers using brewed coffee for the water and only using half the vanilla. It was my first time making toffee, so I was a little hesitant. After reading all the reviews about it breaking, I made sure to stay on low heat til the butter was melted, and it was really a very quick and easy recipe! The coffee flavor is very, very....subtle. I think next time I'd make a paste with instant espresso powder and the same water instead for a stronger coffee flavor.

The cupcakes were Beranbaum's almond cupcakes with half the almond extract and half the vanilla and adding two tsp of instant espresso powder with the dry ingredients. I'd probably make it three or four next time. The buttercream was Rosenberg's again (vanilla) - very tasty!

Voting for ICE will start Sun., March 1 at 8 and run through Fri., March 6 at noon. Voting is at NO ONE PUTS CUPCAKE IN A CORNER, http://mkecupcakequeen.blogspot.com Visit http://ironcupcake.blogspot.com if you'd like to bake along!

Our February ETSY PRIZE-PACK is from artists:

• DIANAEVANS
  
• as well as a pair of cupcake earrings from LOTS OF SPRINKLES
• PLUS, IronCupcake:Earth can not forget our good friend, CAKESPY, , who is now going to be doing a piece for our winner each month until further notice - sweet!

As an added bonus for February, SWEET CUPPIN CAKES BAKERY AND CUPCAKERY SUPPLY will be tossing in a variety of cupcaking supplies, .

Last and certainly not least, don’t forget our corporate prize providers: HEAD CHEFS by FIESTA PRODUCTS,, HELLO CUPCAKE by Karen Tack and Alan Richardson, , JESSIE STEELE APRONS ; TASTE OF HOME books, ; a t-shirt from UPWITHCUPCAKES.COM . Iron Cupcake:Earth is sponsored in part by 1-800-Flowers.