Happy Groundhog Day--did the famous Punxsutawney Phil see his shadow? I will have to check...
But in the meantime many of us are thinking to our weekend plans for the “Big Game.” Have you noticed how all the advertisements for grocery stores and others make no mention of the two words “super” and “bowl” connected to one another? I am thinking that the phrase “Super Bowl” must be trademarked and unable to be used when selling something.
Yes, the Super Bowl is on Sunday and as a child, I always loved the Super Bowl: the fun, the food, the advertisements (side note: have you seen the teaser for the new Volkswagon commercial? If you have Star Wars fans in your home, you will want to be sure not to miss it!) and as a young child, the fact that I was able to stay up late to watch the whole game.
If you’re hosting or going to a Super Bowl party this year and want a fun dessert, check out these Football Cupcakes:
I made these for G’s recent birthday party, using Anne Burrell’s Sour Cream Cupcake recipe.
These were the best homemade cupcakes I’ve ever tasted. Since I used an all-natural cupcake recipe, I opted for all-natural frosting too. For the footballs I used a little chocolate frosting (1/4 cup melted chocolate added to 4 oz light cream cheese, a dash of vanilla and milk and 1 1/2 - 2 cups confectioners sugar) in the shape of a football with some white icing (about 2 tablespoons milk with 1/2 - 1 cup confectioners sugar) laces.
But for the green, I used something different for food dye: spinach!
Spinach, steamed in water for several minutes and strained, to make about 3 tablespoons of spinach mush (culinary term, to be sure). I combined it with 2 tablespoons of vanilla soy milk (to add the vanilla flavor) and pureed it in my blender and then strained out the excess pulp:
I then combined the green spinach "dye," with 4 oz of light cream cheese, 1 teaspoon vanilla extract and 1 tablespoon additional soy milk. I then blended it with about 1 1/2 - 2 cups confectioners sugar:
Sure, it is not kelly green, it is a light mint, but for our purposes, it suited G just great and (and this is important!) it did not taste like spinach.
Who says you need to use food dye for frostings?
Life is sweet,
SPC
