Saffron Citrus Sweethearts

I don't usually frost my cakes. I can't picture myself snacking on a stick of butter nor spooning powder sugar into my mouth, so there's no reason why I suddenly eat it after some whipping action and an addition of essence. Rose's le pain d'epice is one of the types I much prefer. Each cupcake has 1/2 tablespoon of butter only and a chokeful of flavors from citrus and spices. Although quite a few ingredients were replaced, I still stick to her original proportion of wet and dry ingredients as this cake turns out sturdy (but moist!) enough to allow me doing some cut-outs without breaking it.

This recipe requires liquid bubbling hot before mixing in. It is not a new concept to me, I've done it a few times, one of the methods to soften the crumb. I don't know what the scientific explanation is behind, seems to me, the hot temperature is to (cook) break the gluten, the structure ideal for bread but not cake. Rose spooned jam into batter before bake (I've tried with a wonderful result). This time I added it after the cakes were done so that I could create the 'heart' ... you know I'm fussy. To compensate the lost moisturizer (jam), I had evaporate milk in batter.

Recipe: (yield 6 cupcakes)

*adapted the recipe of Le Pain D'pice from Rose at 64 sq ft kitchen *

*decoration's idea from Sale & Pepe maggio 2007*

• 1 1/2 cups plain/all-purpose bleached flour
• 1/2 cup evaporate milk
• a small pinch of saffron threads
• 3 1/2 Tbps sugar
• 3 Tbps butter
• 3 - 5 Tbps lemon marmalade
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• a pinch of salt
• for decoration: berry preserve and powder sugar

Direction:

• Soak saffron in evaporate milk for 30 minutes, set aside. When you proceed the following, start to oven to 400F
• In a large mixing bowl, combine flour, baking soda and salt. Set aside.
• In a small pan/pot, melt butter over low heat, add sugar and saffron-milk mixture, bring to boil over low heat also. Once it boils immediately pour into the flour mixture, stir quickly to mix, but don't over-stir. Then fold in lemon marmalade. The batter is quite thick.
• Spoon the mixture in paper cup, moist your fingers with a bit of water (so won't stick) to press the batter down. Bake for 12 minutes, tested with a toothpick if it comes out (almost) clean the cakes are done. Cool on rack. These cakes taste great on the next day, wrap and store in cool room temperature.
• To decorate the cupcakes: use a very sharp serrated knife to slice the top off. For the dome, cut out a heart shape with a mini-cookie cutter. For the body of the cake, hollow the center a bit, fill in fruit preserve. Then put the dome back, sprinkle some powder sugar, fill its 'heart' with more preserve.

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