cupcake five: pistachio

"There's nothing inherently wrong with cupcakes...But our society's twisting of the cupcake's role has become a sickness."-Joel Stein, Time Magazine

Nuttiness (of the adjective nutty)
1) abounding in or producing nuts
2) nut like, especially in flavor
3) insane
4) excessively interested, excited or the like

Recently, a friend gave my beau (or as I like to refer to him, my possible soul mate--you can call him SM), a yummy jar of pistachio and honey spread that she had picked up on a recent trip to Hungary. Closer inspection of the label revealed that our friend had not just selected any run of the mill spread. The hilarious label featured a picture of a bald, body builder with English text that read: "super performance doping" and "for everyone who wants to be young with a strong mind, and nerves for every old man who dreams to have his youth back." SM and I deemed the "super doping spread" nutty on all levels--inside the jar and out.

As I was looking through the cabinet for inspiration for the next cupcake, I came across the pistachio spread and the irony of its existence in my cabinet was not lost on me. Was the nut spread given to SM because he is slightly nutty? Yes. Am I nutty about cupcakes? An emphatic yes. A nutty delight would be just the cupcake I was looking for. I instantly knew that pistachio cupcakes were the perfect finale to Pink Rickshaw's Asian inspired cupcake series.

Pistachio nuts are bright green in color and have a mild nutty flavor. They are often used in sweets and ice cream throughout South Asia and Europe. The flavor is gaining popularity in the U.S. as a well-liked gelato flavor and even Blue Bell ice cream recently added the flavor to their collection. Cupcakeblog.com provided the perfect recipe for pistachio cupcakes with rose petal butter cream icing. A word of caution: this recipe is somewhat complicated and requires the use of pistachio cream and rose jelly. These two items may be tricky to find. The good news is, you can make simple substitute of rose water (available at most grocery stores) for the rose jelly. Pistachio cream can be easily made by grinding pistachios with sugar. These delicious cupcakes are well worth the effort, and a perfect demonstration of our favorite nut.

We hope that satisfies your cupcake fix for now. What was your favorite cupcake in the series? Let us know.

image source: cupcakeblog.com

-RW

Comments

[chai tea latte]

mango was my favorite!!