Tenth Sunday - Cupcakes Again?

What a lovely Sunday dinner -- this time spent celebrating a delicious birthday for a delightful friend (click on the picture above to see her in action). Thanksgiving in March was the theme this time with two new recipes and a variation on two other recipes. A dry brined turkey was the centerpiece of the meal with baby potatoes steamed and fried in chicken broth, asparagus with lemon dressing, white beans and a fresh baby green salad with goat cheese phyllo beggar's purses. For dessert we used the recipe from Martha Stewart's one pan chocolate sheet cake for giant cupcakes topped with white chocolate ganache and semi-sweet whipped chocolate ganache. The cupcakes were filled with strawberry jam or white vanilla bean/sour cream filling. YUMMM......

The turkey was a combination of two recipes from Fine Cooking flavored under the skin with a compound herb butter which kept the meat juicy and tasty and a dry salt brine. An interesting technique which made the skin nice and crispy. The potatoes were also from Fine Cooking and were truly amazing requiring very little supervision. The asparagus were a repeat and were equally delicious as last time.


The vinaigrette and phyllo beggars' purses were from the Barefoot Contessa's latest cookbook and were amazing! This was the first time I worked with phyllo and although the phyllo was a bit brittle (from age) it was pretty easy to form into the purses. For an extra pretty presentation a chive ribbon might be a nice variation.


The basic cupcakes which we've made several times were moist and extremely flavorful. The addition of a filling and a new frosting came from Cooks Illustrated. The secret of the filling is to bake the cupcake first, cut out a cone shape from the top of the cupcake, set aside the cone and fill. Re-top with the cupcake cone and frost covering the incision. Next time I'll try the Boston Cream Cake variation.