vegetarian beer dinner

My oven is broken.

This would normally not be a big deal. Rarely do I make anything that does not cook in the microwave. But of course the broken oven situation would coincide with a beer cupcake situation.

This weekend was the third Vegetarian Beer Dinner hosted by blogger and friend Lauren of Veg:ology. I took the dessert course and promised to deliver beer cupcakes. I had no backup plan.

The day went something like this. Print off vegan cupcake recipe. Brainstorm how to get beer in the recipe without watering it down. Turn on oven. Make said recipe. Put batter in cupcake tins lined with my favorite recycled biodegradable cupcake liners. Open oven door. Yell, “EVAN!!!” Realize that the oven is not going to work. Pour batter from favorite biodegradable cupcake liners in to small tray that fits in the toaster oven. Say a prayer to the vegan beer cake Gods asking to please let this work and bake in the toaster.

To my astonishment, it actually worked. I served my beer “cake” with a vegan vanilla frosting, topped with crumbles of dark chocolate. The beer in the batter and served as my pairing was Duck Rabbit Brown Ale. It was just delightful.

A special shout out to all the other bloggers at the dinner.

Lauren, Veg:ology

Liz, I Heart Vegetables

Sarah, The Smart Kitchen

Adrienne, Hippie Itch

Check out their sites for their killer recipes. I would give you mine, but there is no chance it will ever work again. It truly was a vegan beer cake miracle.

{beercakes} terrapin liquid bliss

Photo by Mollee Sullivan

I have had a bottle of a beer called “Liquid Bliss” in my refrigerator since December. Can you imagine having something with the words liquid and bliss written on it and not drinking it for months? I plead temporary insanity.

So what is Liquid Bliss, you ask? It is a Chocolate Peanut Butter Porter brewed by Terrapin Beer Co. A quote directly from Beer Street Journal describes it as a beer that will “please your inner fat kid as much as the inner alcoholic.” I could not agree more.

The occasion that got me to break out this beer was a batch of cupcakes I made for a fellow blogger, Mollee of Mollee Made. I had put a feeler out on twitter asking for photoshop assistance in exchange for beer.  I am clueless when it comes to photo editing and needed help editing a picture taken of me at New York Fashion Week. Mollee responded that she would be happy to help in exchange for my beer cupcakes that she had read about here on the blog. A completely perfect trade!

She fixed up my photo and I whipped up a batch of chocolate beercakes with the Liquid Bliss, topped with cream cheese butter cream and a chocolate covered peanut. (You can check out the photo on my about page.)

This little exchange got me thinking. How fun would it be to bake for goods and services? I have sold my beercakes for actual money and it kind of stressed me out. In both cases the buyers were happy with their purchase, but the whole concept of baking for money makes me anxious.

Baking for trade, however, is a whole other story! I always seem to feel better about an even exchange rather than dollars and cents. So far, I have made three trade deals with my beercakes and in every case I felt great about the transaction. I have traded for photography, traded for Hardywood Gingerbread Stout, and now traded for photo editing. I think I might just be on to something.

This idea deserves a little exploration and I would love to hear from you. Could I make this beer baking bartering system work?

{beercakes} hardywood gingerbread stout

You can only eat so many desserts before you think you are going to lose it like a marathon runner at mile 25. I got pretty close to that point and did not even try half of the competing desserts at the Hardywood Gingerbread Stout dessert pairing competition.

The beer by itself is pretty intense. It has a honey sweetness and chocolatey richness that is practically a dessert in a bottle. Nothing pairs better with dessert than more dessert, so why not hold a contest to find the best pairing by asking people to eat over 30 desserts and pick a favorite. Genius!

My submission was a beercake made with the Gingerbread Stout topped with a spiced cream cheese butter cream and pieces of candied ginger. It looked good, tasted good and went really well with the beer.

I brought with me a small posse of friends and family. My sister-in-law was lobbying just as good as any of the DC professionals to get my cupcake in the final round. She kept walking by my cupcake display saying things like, “Oh my God, did you try that cupcake? I think it is my favorite.” Jess, you may have a future in politics.

Photo by Hardywood

I did make it to the top 5 for review by the official judges, but another dessert beat me and I was named as one of the runners up. I was a gracious loser and did not have a Faith Hill moment. I took my consolation prize of a bottle of Gingerbread Stout and left with my head held high.

After the contest a stranger stopped me in the parking lot to tell me he really liked my cupcake. That was just as good as winning. (Not really, winning, is just as good as winning.) My friend Brian Wilson so eloquently put it, that means “you are the first loser”. He always knows how to say just the right thing.

Until next year...

{beercakes} hardywood park craft brewery

The only thing that I have ever been passionately competitive about is board games. I don’t run races, or participate in team sports, but get my in front of a folding board, a deck of cards, or a pair of dice and it is game on. Every member of my family will tell you, I hate to lose at a board game.

Today is the day I compete at something off the board. I have signed up for a dessert pairing competition at my favorite brewery, Hardywood Park, and I really want to win.

My first time making beercakes was with Hardywood’s summer seasonal beer,
Virginia Strawberry. This beer was phenomenal in a cupcake. And even if the Hardyheads did not worship it like some of their other brews, it was a favorite for me. I made several batches for friends and coworkers and every cupcake was met with oohs and ahhs.

The second beer I tried baking with was another Hardywood brew, Virginia Blackberry. This recipe turned out to be my favorite. I made them for a blogger vegetarian beer dinner and scored major points by pairing the beercake with a lemon butter cream and filling it with blackberry jam.

I experimented with beers from plenty of other breweries, but always came back to my hometown favorite. So, when I saw that the much anticipated release of Hardywood Gingerbread Stout would be kicked off with a dessert competition taking place at the brewery, I knew it was my destiny.

I baked my little heart out this weekend and look forward to a good competition today at 6:00pm. If you are in the area, you can be a judge by being one of the first 30 people at the brewery this afternoon. The winner of the contest gets a case of Gingerbread Stout and their dessert on the menu at Capital Ale House. Wish me luck…

{beercakes} the halloween oreo kind

This is my Halloween beercake post.

Yes, I realize that Halloween already happened, but in New Jersey it has been postponed until Monday. Yes, I realize that I do not live in New Jersey. That is not really the point.

I will admit here to all of you that I have not been baking lately and seem to have lost my rhythm of blog posting. I could blame the hurricane, but that is obviously not it at all. You see, I suffer from this disease called “I-volunteer-for-too-many-things-until-I-have-a-nervous-breakdown” syndrome. It isn’t contagious, but it does drive my family crazy.

I am a joiner and when I commit, I go all the way. My current list of volunteer positions and projects makes my head spin. Here is a quick directory of titles that you could call me:

• Sales & Marketing Director for a restaurant in the middle of the busy season
• Board Member for the Greater Richmond Tourism Association
• Dancer with the RVA Dance Collective
• Organizer for the Richmond New In Town Meetup Group
• Planner of my BFF’s Bachelorette Weekend/Bridal Shower in January
• Cyclist committed to 30 consecutive days of indoor cycling

Needless to say this does not leave a whole lot of time for people to call me things like “beer baker”, “blogger” or “person who makes rational decisions about taking on projects”.

I just realized that this post was supposed to be about beercakes. Quick, here’s another picture.

If I was baking with beer, I would definitely be making chocolate cupcakes with various Stouts and Porters. I would be topping them with citrus flavored butter cream frosting and would most definitely be crushing up Oreos to go on top of that frosting. These cupcakes would be very Halloween-y and would be enjoyed on Monday, in honor of all of the people having a much more difficult time than I am, in New Jersey.

I like to joke, but we all know that the people affected by hurricane Sandy don't really need cupcakes. They need money. If you would like to make a donation please visit: http://www.redcross.org/charitable-donations

{beercakes} harpoon i.p.a.

I am a sucker for good packaging and celebrity endorsements. I once paid $5 for a bottle of Smart Water because Jennifer Aniston made it look good in Glamour Magazine. I admit that I felt cool buying it, even though I am in no way a water snob. I picked tap water during a blind taste test to decide which new bottled water we would serve where I work. I went so far to exclaim how much better I thought the tap water was, thinking it was the expensive bottled variety.

The same trick works for beer, as long as its cold, I usually like it. But a great label does make a difference when I am browsing the beer aisle. I absolutely love the Harpoon I.P.A. label which is part of the reason I wanted to use this beer for an I.P.A. beercake. This beer is also very good, so it is a double bonus.

I do find it kind of at odds that an I.P.A. would have such a pretty label. When I think of an I.P.A. drinker, I think of a guy in a t-shirt with a beard, not necessarily the kind of person who appreciates a purple floral beer label. But maybe I have misjudged I.P.A. drinking dudes. Maybe they are just as crazy about packaging as I am and just maybe they also got tricked in to buying Smart Water by that Aniston character.

For the Harpoon I.P.A. beercakes, I used an almond buttercream frosting. To be honest, the version you see in the pictures was my attempt to fix a messed up frosting debacle the first time I tried the almond buttercream recipe. They still turned out pretty cute and I have since much improved the recipe. The last batch of almond frosted I.P.A. cakes that I made were a favorite among my survey pool (i.e. coworkers). Two separate test subjects said this was their favorite frosting to date. I love when that happens.

{beercakes} southern tier porter

It has been a couple weeks since I posted any beercakes photos. I still have a folder full of cupcake glamour shots, so I figured it was about time I started leaking them out.

When I started baking beer cupcakes, it was genuinely just for fun. I had a fridge full of beer and a hankering for something sweet and figured why not combine the two. I had no idea how hooked I would get on trying out different flavors and thinking up frosting pairings. It became my mission to make a better batch each time and I found myself spending entire days baking for no other reason than to dump the batches off at work. My coworkers became sugar addicted and demands starting rolling in for more.

Then my photographer friends started getting excited about them and wanted to trade photos for cupcakes which is a deal you never turn down. I had my first cupcake photo shoot resulting in the beautiful shots you are witnessing on this blog and more people started getting excited about them.

As a result of me pushing these beercakes like crack rocks for no other reason than so that I did not eat them all myself and gain 4,000 pounds, something very exciting has happened…..I got not one, but two PAID cupcake gigs!

I will be working on recipe development this weekend which basically means tasting all different kinds of beer to find inspiration. I know it is a tough job, but I am up for the challenge.

It just goes to show…If you bake it, they will come.

Happy Friday!

{beercakes} buffalo bill’s orange blossom cream ale

When I started my beer baking experiments, I was basically just trying to clean out my fridge. The only beers I bought specifically to bake with were Hardywood Strawberry and Blackberry. But, on a recent trip down the craft beer aisle, I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to grab a six pack of Buffalo Bill’s Orange Blossom Cream Ale. This California brew seemed like it was made to be baked in a cupcake.

 

The cupcake turned out moist and dense as per usual with a beercake. Some of the creaminess of the beer came through, but I think in future batches I will put some orange zest directly in the batter to give them a little more zing.

 

I filled this batch with vanilla butter cream frosting. I used one of my decorating tips to pull out a little bit of the center and piped in the frosting. That left me with a handful of cupcake holes and it was very tempting not to eat them all. I topped them with an orange butter cream and voilá, a beercake six pack!

 

{beercakes} hardywood strawberry

My experiments in beer baking have done more than make me popular at work. They have given me something to contribute to a celebration. Since I am a terrible cook, I always got anxious when we were invited to a potluck. But, this weekend when the invite to a friend’s birthday said “no need to bring food or gifts”, I still offered to bring beercakes. My offer was not turned down.

Little did I know that I was going up against my favorite bakery in Richmond, Shindigz. It was a party, not a pastry competition, but knowing that my cupcakes would be served along side the salted chocolate cake was intimidating. Their cakes are freaking amazing and the salted chocolate is one of my absolute favorites only to be surpassed by their spotted cow cake.

The pressure was on.

So far, the Hardywood Strawberry cupcakes are Evan’s favorite and I pretty much use him as my barometer for all things edible. That way, if people don’t like them, I can blame him for picking the wrong flavor. I also figured these would be the best option as an alternative to chocolate cake.

For the party, I made them filled with Agriberry strawberry jam and topped with cream cheese butter cream. Lucky for Evan, they were a total hit! Some people even preferred them to the chocolate cake. That may be more to do with the fact that some people don’t like chocolate, or that Evan was paying people to say they like them so he wouldn’t have to sleep on the sofa, but I will take it either way.

Everyone keeps asking me, “What are you making all these cupcakes for?” I think it is pretty obvious. I am doing it so that I will be invited to parties, because my personality alone is not going to cut it.

Want to see more amazing pictures of beercakes? Follow me on Facebook.

{beercakes} hardywood blackberry

Hardywood Blackberry Cupcakes with Lemon Butter Cream, filled with Agriberry Blackberry Jam

Over the past few weeks, I have been perfecting my beer cupcake recipes and in the process have completely spoiled all of my coworkers. Now, if I show up to work without my cupcake carrier, people are disappointed and kind of confrontational about it.  Well, today these moochers hit the jackpot because I had 4 dozen cupcakes to be eaten after my first cupcake photo shoot.

You read that right, a photo shoot for cupcakes. It kind of felt like when people have photo shoots with their pets and dress them up in different outfits and use a squeaky toy to make them look at the camera, only without the squeaky toy. I did at one point say to the photographer, “Doesn’t she look pretty?” Which I am pretty sure is the first sign of a serious sickness. Luckily, that photographer is also a friend and didn’t even acknowledge my insanity.

Patrick Hannan, part fireman, part traveler, part photographer and part food stylist, took some amazing shots of my beer cupcakes and accepted payment in the form of cupcakes and beer. I think we both made out pretty well.

I will be sharing all the photos from the shoot over the next couple of weeks both here and on the new Thirsty Richmond Facebook page. Please, click over and follow me there.

 

vegetarian beer dinner

Photo by Brittany

The funny thing about hanging out with bloggers is that I always feel like a stalker. I already know what is going on in their lives because I read their blogs. So even though I may have only met them one other time, I know about their marathon training, business adventures, wedding planning and what they had for dinner last night. It can sometimes make small talk a little awkward.

I imagine this is very similar to hanging out with celebrities. For example, if I was to go to a dinner with Kristen Stewart, I am not going to ask, “So Kristen, are you dating anyone?” I already know the answer to this question. The answer is no because Edward is not playing her games. He is officially on the market, and why I wasn’t going to dinner with him in this fake scenario is a mystery to me even as I type this.

I managed to show a little self restraint in being a total creeper, at least for the first half of the beer dinner. Lauren of Veg:ology was the host and each guest brought a vegetarian dish with a beer pairing. After the first couple of courses, I realized that a beer buzz was starting to settle in and my filter was starting to waiver. About half way through the dinner I excused myself to use the restroom and upon my return I announced to the entire table that I looked in Lauren’s bathroom closet and determined that we use the same brand of mousse. In my defense, it was not as if I opened the closet, the mousse was in plain view, but I guess you could consider that an over share.

Luckily, they did not ask me to leave. I think most people were too distracted by the amazing food and beers to worry about whether or not I would be going through their purses later. (If any of you are reading this, I totally did not!)

Of course the food was good, because of bunch of bloggers made it. These girls are some of the most inspiring home cooks that I have ever come across. They create the most amazing food that is not only good, but healthy, too. It is no small feat for me to want to eat only vegetables. I was so full by the end of the meal that I could not finish my cupcake. Crazy, I know.

I am sure that they will be posting recipes from the dinner soon, so here is a quick recap of the courses:

1. Tomato Gazpacho and Cheese Straws with Bison Honey Basil Beer by Sarah and Alex

2. Bruschetta with gorgonzola and green apples with Hoegaarden by Adrienne

3. Vegetable Tian with Allagash Curieux by Brittany

4. Tabbouleh with Dirty South I.P.A. (home brew) by Bob

5. Zuchinni and Black Bean Enchiladas with Cigar City Maduro Oatmeal Brown Ale by Lauren

6. Cupcakes with Hardywood Blackberry by me

My contribution to the dinner was Hardywood Blackberry cupcakes made with Agriberry blackberry jam, lemon butter cream frosting and a blackberry on top. They turned out better than I could have hoped for. And thank goodness because I really needed to redeem myself so that people would know why Lauren invited the crazy girl.

{beercakes} hardywood strawberry

Ok, folks, welcome to my new experiment, phase one, beer cakes!! I am so damn excited about how these turned out that I can hardly contain myself.

I have tons of beer in my fridge, but haven’t had much time to drink it because we have been busy having beer cocktails and chicken salad sandwiches. I knew I wanted to buckle down and work through what was in the fridge when an idea came to me. Why not use some of this beer to make cupcakes?

I have heard of people making cupcakes with Guinness and thought immediately that the Hardywood Strawberry would be an interesting beer to try to bake with.

A quick google search and I found this recipe for Coronoa and Blue Moon cupcakes on Sweet Tooth. I swapped the Blue Moon for Hardywood and made a basic cream cheese butter cream frosting. I tried stuffing a couple of the cupcakes with strawberries, inspired by Brittany’s post from last week on Eating Bird Food.

I completely burnt the first batch and it was such a buzz kill. I tried not to get too discouraged because the top of the cupcake tasted pretty damn good.

I was determined to make it work and round two was a complete success! I had 15 taste tester friends who all agreed they are excellent! (My one friend had no shame in eating three in a row. And she did not get drunk, so no worries if you have to drive somewhere.)

In honor of Virginia Craft Beer month this August, I will be experimenting with a bunch of different Virginia Craft Beers. I will let you know how it goes.

Speak to me: Do you have a favorite Virginia Beer that you think would make a great cupcake?