Colorado Wildfire Cupcakes

I first found Stef's cupcake blog, the Cupcake Project, looking for a root beer cupcake recipe about two years ago. Surprisingly, the cupcake wasn't very good. It didn't rise in the center, the texture was off and the cupcake was oily. Thinking back to similar mishaps and realizing that most recipes are geared toward the flatlands, I went on a quest for high altitude recipes. Coming up short, I decided to create a collection of adapted recipes for those of us at higher elevations.

Loving how Stef began her cupcake blogging adventure (wedding cupcakes for friends) and that she started as a complete novice, I follow her blog religiously. It was there that I learned of the annual Cupcake Project and Scoopalicious Ice Cream Cupcake Contest. Each year (this being the 5th) presents such creativity and fun looking cupcake entries!

by Keith Pond

This year, I decided to try my hand at an ice cream cupcake recipe. June being a very busy month for me at work, it was not until about the last week of the competition that I had time to partake. As recipes were dancing in my head and just when I decided on making an Amaretto concoction, the wildfires in my home state hit literally--home.

The Waldo Canyon fire started and continues to be very close to the city raising alarm to those with homes in and around the path of destruction. With record heat and unpredictable high winds, the fire couldn't have happened at a worse time. As of today, 18,000 acres have burned, 347 homes destroyed, 2 fatalities and stands at 30% containment.

I personally know some effected by the fire, five whose homes were in direct path, three whose homes were confirmed destroyed and more close friends and coworkers that have/had been evacuated. 

It is deeply saddening and what's even more devastating is that an arsonist is suspected. Until it is 100% contained and those who lost so much can start rebuilding, I don't think the city's morale can recover.

I admit, I was not going to enter a cupcake this year. As I started making the Amaretto cupcake after the worst of the fire, my heart was just not in it. But after talking with my good friends, they suggested that I make a Colorado Wildfire Cupcake inspired by the those who are fighting the wildfires. This cupcake also helps out local businesses by including ingredients made only in this lovely town.

They advised that if just one person visited the helping organizations by reading my entry that it would be a great tribute to those who are tirelessly fighting the wildfires. The following sites help in local and national disasters: 

Pikes Peak United Way
Red Cross
Care and Share
Salvation Army
Help Colorado Now
Waldofire.com
Pikes Peak Community Foundation / Waldo Canyon Fire Fighter Fund
Buy a T-shirt for a Firefighter (or yourself-local artist's designs)

Colorado Wildfire Cupcakes are Graham Cracker Cupcakes topped with Rocky Mountain Road Ice Cream and a Salted Laughing Lab Caramel Topping. Rocky Mountain Road ice cream is made fresh at Josh & John’s, a local creamery that has been a staple in Colorado Springs since 1986. Josh & John’s uses turn of the century machines and only the finest ingredients to produce a creamy delicious ice cream. Rocky Mountain Road ice cream is a classic take on rocky road as a chocolate ice cream with chocolate chucks, marshmallows, and walnuts.

Laughing Lab Ale is brewed only from natural ingredients at Bristol Brewery, a local brewery founded in 1994. Bristol's mission it to make beer that called to mind three things: quality, purity, and sanity. Lauging Lab is a scottish style ale that has a nutty, roasted flavor that’s mildly sweet, but not too rich.

Graham Cracker Cupcakes

adapted from Amanda Cupcake

preheat oven to 375 degrees

1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened

3/4 cup caster sugar

1 egg

5 oz all purpose flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

3/4 cup graham cracker crumbs

1/4 tsp salt

1 tsp vanilla

1/2 cup buttermilk

1. In a medium bowl combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, graham cracker crumbs, and salt. Set aside.
2. Cream butter and sugar with mixer on medium-high speed until light and fluffy.
3. Add egg. Mix well.
4. In a small bowl combine buttermilk and vanilla.
5. Using a wooden spoon, mix in flour mixture and milk mixture to butter mixture alternating between, starting and ending with flour mixture.
6. Top with dark chocolate chips, brown sugar, and graham crumbs (if desired). Set aside a few chocolate chips to top the caramel covered pretzel sticks.

Makes 12 cupcakes. Fill to about 3/4 full. Bake for 15 minutes or until tester comes out clean. Set aside to cool.

Laughing Lab Caramel Topping
adapted from Sprinkle Bakes

1 12 oz. bottle of Bristol's Laughing Lab, divided
2 cups sugar
1 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1 cup unsalted butter
1 cup heavy cream
1 cup light corn syrup
1 tbsp vanilla bean paste

pretzel rods (if desired)
sea salt as desired

1. In a small saucepan bring 1 cup of ale to a simmer and cook until reduced and syrupy. This will take about 30 minutes and yield about 1 tsp. of concentrated ale flavoring. Set aside. 
2. Combine remaining beer and all other ingredients except ale reduction in a heavy 4-5 quart pot. Cook over medium heat, stirring occasionally. 
3. Continue to cook until candy thermometer reads 230 degrees. You may have noticed this is lower than the original recipe calls for. Higher altitudes effect how candy sets. The rule is to subtract 1 degree per 500 ft. Adjust 240 according to your altitude.
4. Take off stove, stir in vanilla and reduced ale. 

Top cupcakes. Take remaining caramel and pour over a buttered pan containing pretzel rods. Top with salt. Take 3 pretzel rods and just cover the ends, add melted chocolate chips if desired.

Flaming Mini Mallow Cups

idea adapted from Sprinkle Bakes

1 mini marshmallow cup per cupcake

Bacardi 151

1. Carve a well in the cups making sure not to puncture the bottom.
2. Fill with Bacardi 151
3. Add to top of ice cream. Light with match. (Be careful!)

Colorado Wildfire Cupcakes are not the prettiest looking cupcakes and are not the easiest to eat but they sure taste yummy. How I attacked this cupcake is I first blew out the mallow candle (and threw it out), broke up the chocolate & ale caramel covered pretzels over the ice cream, took the wrapper off and put everything in a bowl and devoured it!

The pretzels with the Laughing Lab Ale Caramel are amazing (and just the caramel by itself)! If you have not tried beer caramel, I urge you to. I usually make this with an IPA, but from now on it will be with Bristol's Lab. It is a lighter smoother ale taste that I cannot get enough of and it gives the caramel a bit of an effervescence that cannot be matched.

The graham cracker cupcake is light and a perfect companion for Josh & John’s Rocky Mountain Road ice cream.