Festival Day; Baking Challenge Complete

Clump #242:  Finish S’mores Cupcakes; final day of the seven-day bake-a-thon.

So, first off, the marshmallows caught on fire. Funny, now, though not at the time; the parchment paper had been too close to the heating element in the oven.  Oops!  Take two.

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The chocolate part of the s’more cupcake called for chocolate ganache, which I had never made before.  Wow.  Cream and really good chocolate.  How can you go wrong?

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I used about a tablespoon on each cupcake and spread it out from the center.

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After it had set, it was a cinch to wrap … usually a challenge with frosted cupcakes.  Fall Festival, here they come!

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I was missing our younger daughter, the queen of chocolate ganache and other culinary wonders, but this year our older daughter flew in for the festival. She played the bride in an annual reenactment of the first wedding in our meetinghouse, held in the eighteenth century.  I played the mother of the groom:

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An old Quaker selfie.  Time now to rest these old weary bones!

More S’mores

Clump #239:  Bake graham cracker cupcakes; day four of seven-day bake-a-thon: one baked-good-a-day to avoid the usual pre-Fall Festival log jam.

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Some days contain more darkness than light: exhibit my tired, worn down, and shadow-like emotional state.  But even on a day like today, baking was accomplished.

I spent this past summer with the intention of making S’mores Cupcakes from a recipe I saw in Real Simple magazine.  I never got around to it, so the time is now!

Progress alert: I probably tossed the magazine containing the recipe in a recycling bag during one of my paper purges.  But no problem … I easily found it online.  Let that be a lesson.  I really don’t have to have so much paper around me.

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The cake is the graham cracker part of the S’mores equation.  It contains one cup of graham cracker crumbs, or nine crackers.  How many crackers in a package?  Nine.  Very satisfying.

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This was my maternal grandmother’s rolling pin.  It gives me confidence, when using it, to know that she was renowned for her pies.

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Disaster was averted by my husband who managed to finesse the gears back into the Kitchen Aid mixer.  Heavens, is it telling me that I’m doing too much baking?

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And the finished cupcakes, cooling down.  I’ll freeze, thaw, and finish them later.  They smell really-really good.

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Ready or not, October is here and, like my goose friend in Strasburg …

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one must gear-up and get with it!