Pizza Cupcakes!

   I love to experiment and have fun in my kitchen. I also loooove pizza. After perfecting my pizza dough recipe (took a few years to get the proportions just right!), I soon became bored with making the same old pie. So, with a little inspiration, I give to you:

Pizza Cupcakes!

You will need: 

• Pizza dough (homemade or store-bought, though I highly recommend the former - recipe below ;))
• Marinara or pizza sauce (again, homemade or store-bought)
• Mozzarella cheese (regular or vegan, shredded)
• Pepperoni (regular or vegan, diced small)
• Oil (I use coconut oil for this)
• Cupcake pan (or a muffin pan for pizza muffins!)

If making your own dough, you'll also need:

• 2 1/4 teaspoon yeast
• 1 tsp sugar
• 1 cup bread flour (or all-purpose flour + 1 tbs vital wheat gluten)
• 1 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
• 2 tbs oil (I use grapeseed in mine)
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 cup warm water

   To make the dough, add the yeast and sugar to the cup of warm water. Let sit until bubbles form. Then add the rest of your ingredients. Knead the dough to form a soft ball. Let rise, covered in a bowl, for 30 minutes to an hour, or until doubled in size. Mine usually doesn't  take long to rise at all! Once risen, punch the dough in the center and then knead again briefly. Now your dough is ready to use!

   Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Grease your cupcake pan using the coconut oil and a paper towel. Then pinch off enough dough to cover the bottom of the cupcake pan. Spread it out and make sure some of the dough is coming up the sides. Now you'll spoon a little marinara on top of the dough and coat evenly. Then sprinkle on the cheese and diced pepperoni. Bake for about 15-20 minutes until the tops are brown and the cheese is melted. Let cool briefly and enjoy your cute mini pizzas! :)

   Thank you for letting me share this recipe with you! It's a hit for both kids and adults and is super easy to make. Have fun in the kitchen and as always, stay clean!!!

I HEART Cupcakes!!

What is it about cupcakes that makes most people smile? Is it that a cupcake is a bundle of yumminess in a small, pretty package? Is it the fact that you aren't committed to just ONE flavor of cake or frosting? Or is it the SPRINKLES (yes, cupcakes MUST have sprinkles!)? What has me in this cupcake fantasy world, you may ask? Last night I was looking through my cupcake recipe book to see what delightful little cakes I should make for a football game party at a friends house this weekend and I found it so hard to decide what to make! Do I make vanilla cakes? Chocolate? Strawberry? Lemon? All of the above? And should I put the same kind of frosting on all of them? So many options! Then I got distracted because I started to wonder WHERE cupcakes originated so I started looking online to see if anyone knew. I found that the term "cupcake" was first used in a book of recipes from 1828 and since hearth ovens were used primarily around the turn of the 20th century, muffin tins were used to bake cakes because they required less time to bake than a large cake. According to the Food Timeline website, food historians are unsure of the origin of the name CUPCAKE - could be because they were baked in cups (before the muffin tin came along) or if it is because the ingredients used to make the cakes were measured out by the cup. Either way, I am soooo glad that someone came up with the concept! And after reading about cupcakes, I decided to run to the cupcake shop around the corner from my house and get myself a treat to eat while I decided on what to bake. In the end, I decided to make chocolate cupcakes with chocolate frosting and sprinkles (told ya, GOTTA have sprinkles!!) and strawberry with cream cheese frosting and fresh strawberries on top. I think everyone will enjoy them!

Enjoy your weekend and keep it clean!