It worked, it worked and finally it's raining, how great!!!!

First of all for the fire on the Carmel and second all the plants and trees which so desperately wanted some water already. And third for all the people, like me, who are waiting for the winter.

A very nice fair will take place on the 16th /17th and 18th of December in Tel Aviv.

Here you have all the details:

I will be there also with my cupcakes, I'll try to make them in Retro style also.

And finally, a few photo's of some of the cupcakes I have made lately

Winter doesn't want to show it's face yet in Israel, it's still so warm and no rain what so ever.

I waited for this season for sooo long, all through out the summer I thought never mind in November this will all be over again. But nothing!

It makes it all the more more difficult when my sister calls me, from Holland, a few days ago and tells me, with the excitement of a little girl, that it just started to snow and sends me this picture





I love snow I am just totally crazy about those day's when the snow is falling down, it is so quiet outside when it's snowing. It is like a big white fluffy blanket thrown over the ground.

Any way last year I wrote a post about speculaas cupcakes, speculaas is a typical dutch winter cookie, with the most wonderful combination of spices.

I decided, in order to speed up the winter gods, to post it again. Who knows maybe it will work.

Well and if not it's just a really really good recipe. So go and try it out and taste what a Dutch winter is all about.

Enjoy!

Speculaas cupcakes

Speculaas cookies remind me of winters with warm the and a cozy couch next to the garden window where we would sit with my mom and sister when we returned from school. We'd come home from school cold or wet, In Holland most of the kids go to school with......., you guessed it bicycles, and my mam would always be waiting for us with warm tea and a nice plate of goodies. The problem with these cookies is you can't stop. If you dip one in your tea until it is soft and you taste it it's just impossible to stop. For this reason alone already I think it's good that I live in Israel. No speculaas here, until now that is.





Well I sincerely hope you enjoy this recipe. If you would like to make cookies instead of cupcakes you can look up a recipe for speculaas cookies, because you have the recipe for the spices.

Dutch Speculaas kruiden are a mix of:

15 gram ground Cinnamon
2 gram ground clove
2 gram ground nutmeg
1 gram ground white pepper
1 gram ginger powder
½ gram ground hel (Cardamom)

Be very carefull using these spices, because your recipe will become very (too) spicey if you use too much.

For the cupcakes:

230 Gram flower
1 tsp Bakingpowder
125 Gram butter room temp.
250 Gram white sugar

Speculaas spices according to your taste
1 tsp Vanilla extract
3 eggs room temp.
100 ML milk room temp.
1/5 tsp salt. 1.
preheat oven 175ºC

2. Mix butter until fluffy and white , add sugar and eggs (one by one), mix for 3 minutes.

3. Add to this Sifted flower, baking powder and salt, milk, vanilla and spices . Mix this until it all comes together as a batter

4. put ± 12 cupcake liners in a tray and fill them for 2/3 with batter

5. Bake the cupcakes for 15 - 20 minutes. check with a tooth pick, if it comes out clean they're ready

6. Let them cool in the tray for 15 minutes and then transfer them to a wire rack where they can cool.

7. While the cupcakes are cooling you can start making the butter cream

For the butter cream you'll need:
200 gram butter room temp.
1 tsp natural almond essence(or more if you like) -
175 gram confectioners sugar
10 ml milk at room temp.

Method

1. In an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream the butter until fluffy and white for about 3 min.

2. add confectioners sugar (spoon by spoon and scrape the sides of the mixer bowl often), milk and almond essence and mix for about 5-7 minutes at medium speed.

3. When the cupcakes are totally cooled down you can start decorating your cupcakes with the buttercream.

Here some nice ideas for decorating :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Yl6IxVXUw8&NR=1

You can buy your ingredients from (of course there are more places but these 2 I personally like):

http://www.motek-cakes.co.il/
http://www.grubstein.co.il/

See you