Dark Chocolate Cupcakes with Coffee Buttercream

And so it seems I am going to be a pediatrician after all! I've spent so much time, energy, and brain capacity agonizing over  The Match the past two years I hardly know what to do with myself now. Years of work and planning and countless hours of anxiety, stress, and feelings of unworthiness culminate on this single day. And in a matter of moments it's all over, the future is set, the unknowns and what-ifs disappear. It is both calming and unsettling all at once.

Match Day has become ritualized at most medical schools across the country. In general, they fall into one of two camps. In one camp students will gather and open their envelopes all at the same time, celebrating together but preserving the privacy of reading the contents of that envelope. The others make a ceremony of it, asking students to (voluntarily) open their envelopes before an adoring crowd of classmates and family and read the contents aloud. Which is the better way? I always thought I would prefer the first, but the latter does have it's redeeming qualities. While it is somewhat cruel to put students in the spotlight during such an emotionally charged life event, somehow the ceremony makes the day grander and more exciting. It's fun to see the each person's reaction. The key to the success of the ceremony, however, is the mutual agreement among students to participate for the benefit of everyone despite the discomfort. Attending the ceremony without reading your own envelope is taking advantage of the spectacle at the expense of the participants. My school does the ceremony and, yes, I got up and read my envelope. Leading up to the envelope opening, I was extremely anxious (complete with psychogenic chest and abdominal pain for nearly two days!), but it was fun to participate. It really wasn't that bad. I only wish that the 40% of my class who didn't participate had decided to make themselves a bit uncomfortable and join in as well.

Now that I'm in the truly best part of med school (or possibly my entire education), I've  had plenty of time to get back to baking and being human. These cupcakes are moist, chocolate-y, and the frosting will make caffeine-addicts swoon.

Vegan Chocolate Cupcakes (very slightly adapted from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World)

Ingredients

1 cup unsweetened almond milk
1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
3/4 cup sugar
1/3 cup canola or vegetable oil
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup AP flour
1/3 cup dark chocolate cocoa powder (I used Hershey's special dark)
3/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt

Directions

Oven temp: 350 F  Bake time: 18-20 minutes

1. Preheat oven & prepare muffin pan

2. Whisk together almond milk and vinegar in large bowl. Set aside for a few minutes.

3. In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder and salt.

4. Add sugar, oil, and vanilla to almond milk mixture. Beat until foamy.

5. Add dry ingredients to the wet in two batches, beat until no large lumps remain.

6. Fill liners 3/4 full. Bake 18-20 minutes or until toothpick or knife inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool completely before frosting. 

Coffee Buttercream Frosting (not vegan)

1 1/2 Tbsp instant coffee granules (or 1 Starbucks Via packet)

1 1/2 Tbsp water

1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1 1/2 c (3 sticks) unsalted butter, softened

3 c powdered sugar

3 Tbsp milk

1. Combine water, coffee and vanilla. Set aside.

2. Beat butter on medium speed until fluffy (1 min).

3. Decrease speed to low. Add powdered sugar in 3 batches, mixing in after each addition. Increase speed to medium, beat 2-3 minutes.

4. Add coffee mixture and milk. Beat on low to combine then increase to medium and beat 3-4 minutes.

My Misty

Until one has loved an animal, a part of one's soul remains unawakened. 

- Anatole France

Today my beloved pet, Misty, passed away to greener parks. She had been fighting for her life, most probably against a gastrointestinal cancer, for the past six weeks or so. Somehow knowing that her time was coming and that it would deliver her from pain and suffering has not made her passing any easier. When she came in to my life, a little white fluff ball with bright orange ears, we had just lost our first family pet, Muffy. In the midst of our family grief, my grandma found an ad in the newspaper for some poodle puppies. We piled in to my mom's van and drove down to one of the less inviting areas of town and that is where we first met Misty. I picked her out. She was hard to resist with an almost comical appearance, a feisty spirit in her eyes, and boundless energy. She sat on my lap on the way home and stuck her nose in front of the air conditioning vent as if it were the most glorious sensation on earth (and let's face it, in Fresno in the summer it pretty much is); she never did stop loving car AC vents. Although I was excited about our new puppy, once we got her home I didn't quite know what to think. She was playful, but tenaciously so; I was almost afraid of her eagerness and energy. As time went on, the exuberance of puppyhood mellowed into an energetic and companionable adolescence and young dog-hood. She loved jumping to catch balls in the air, playing fetch, going for walks, and chasing ducks in the backyard. Her unabashed delight in life frequently spoiled her elegant appearance such as when she would come inside with green legs after falling in the lake accidentally chasing a duck or when she would sheepishly attempt to hide her soggy paws after miscalculating a jump and falling in the pool. With her larger than life personality and intelligence, she became and integral part of our family, and it has been a wonderful 12 years of Misty Mocha Creme (can you tell I named her while I was in junior high and coffee culture was on the rise?).

In memory of my sweet, loving, persnickety little cuddle bug. I am grateful that you have been delivered from your struggles. Thank you for fighting so bravely. I hope you have lots of toys to rip open in the great beyond.


Grief is like the ocean; it comes on waves ebbing and flowing. Sometimes the water is calm, and sometimes it is overwhelming. All we can do is learn to swim.
-Vicki Harrison

Reindeer Games and the Importance of Flour

Every year when the holidays come around I find my head (and my computer) overflowing with ideas of what I want to do this year for the holidays. Ideas collect throughout the whole year, are forgotten, are remembered, and occasionally I even attempt some of them! Some attempts are more successful than others. As you can see above, my Christmas kitty scarves were a success where as these reindeer cookies....

This is what we should look like!

 ....not so much.

And that, boys and girls, is why you should always be sure you have enough flour for your cookies before you start to make them. Don't be like me. Don't preheat the oven, make most of the dough, and prepare all the decorations only to realize you're 2-3 tablespoons short on flour. It doesn't end well.

Bonus tip from your local absent-minded med student baker: Don't forget the baking powder in your pancakes or they will be thick & dense instead of fluffy.

As always, I'm happy to provide these valuable life lessons any time, free of charge.

Happy pre-holiday time fun everyone!

Halloween Time in photos

It's all in the eyes

The Husband Unit has much better sticker placement skills than I do.

She's watching you

Maybe It's Fall?

 Since moving to southern California seven years ago, I have often heard it expressed by people that I am "so lucky" to live here. Such comments have been directed at me so many times that it must be true, but I still find myself wondering what exactly is there to be envious of? Maybe it's the weather. True, the weather here is nice and stable...and boring. When it is something other than sunny with clear skies, you would think the world had ended. Daily conversations & news media are full of excessively exaggerated reactions to rain and how terrible it is, the number of car accidents increase because rain makes native southern Californians twitchy and nervous on the road, and everyone you talk to will complain about the rain. (True story: One day while walking home in the rain in college, I overheard someone on their cell phone describe the weather as "the Apocalypse").

Or perhaps people envy the hustle & bustle of such a large and diverse population and the car culture of California. Because who doesn't enjoy sitting in bumper to bumper traffic at 5:30 in the morning. Or maybe it's because when it's a truly nice day, even by southern California standards, you can do something fun like go to the beach, an outdoor shopping mall (especially in western OC), or Disneyland...just like the other 14 million people. Or maybe it's the wild abandon with which air conditioning is used in such a way to showcase just how much money there is to throw away here. I mean when it's 70 degrees out who doesn't want to walk into a building Air conditioned to 55F? Nothing says luxury and style like torturing people with Raynaud's for going to work or the grocery store. If nothing else, living in southern California will maintain your sense of humor, because otherwise you'd go mad.

As for myself, I find that I spend more and more time each year in southern CA waiting and waiting for the change of seasons....and I always wind up disappointed. Two years ago, I spend an entire summer in San Diego waiting for a nice sunny summer morning only to meet with cloudy mornings all summer...and then summer was over and I was still waiting. This year, I have been waiting for fall to come. Last week, it finally felt like fall. The mornings had a crispness to them (which was enhanced by a day or two of rain that cleared all the smog out of the air) that returned in the evenings. And then two days later it was 90 degrees again. Nevertheless, I took full advantage of those two days by finally opening a can pumpkin and baking something with those wonderful fall flavors. I had originally planned on just making some oatmeal cookies for the Husband Unit for the day I got to see him in the past couple weeks, but then I thought it was a shame to waste the weather so I mixed in some pumpkin to make it more seasonally festive.

 

These cookies went over really well when I brought them in to my shift last weekend. I think when I make them again, I will add more of the spices; there wasn't quite enough flavor from the spices.