When I collapsed into bed last Saturday night after getting in late from the airport, my last thoughts before I fell asleep were of the Coconut Cupcakes I was planning to make for Easter dessert. I figured I would get up early, hit the grocery store, and have lots of time to bake and decorate. Somehow it just didn’t compute that everything would be closed the next day, which I realized when I bolted awake at 3am.

I scrounged around in the cupboard for coconut and miraculously found two half-full packages, and although it was unsweetened instead of sweetened, I didn’t think it would matter too much. I still needed butter, flour, milk, eggs and cream cheese so I drove to a convenience store near my house on Easter Sunday morning and said a little prayer to the baking gods. Turns out they were open and had everything I needed – an Easter miracle! (haha not really, I know) Since Nicole told me I was only invited to Easter dinner at her house if I brought dessert, I was quite relieved. I actually had a back-up plan in mind with ingredients I already had at home in case the store was closed, and I ended up making it anyway (it’ll get it’s own post!).

For decorating, I used some weird Edible Easter Grass that I bought at Wal-Mart in Florida. It looked great, but because I wasn’t sure how it would taste I only decorated half the cupcakes with it (and some jelly beans). The other half I left plain, sprinkled with coconut and topped with Mini Eggs (p.s. since when do these only come in blue and yellow?).

So the edible grass was fairly gross…it kind of dissolved in your mouth, but not really. Nicole’s friend Luke had a funny face when he was eating it, so I told everyone it was okay if they scraped it off. Next time, I will just dye some coconut green. And maybe plan a little bit better!

Coconut Cupcakes

Source: Barefoot Contessa At Home

Ingredients:

Cupcakes

3 sticks of butter (1 1/2 cups), room temperature

2 cups sugar

5 eggs, room temperature

1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1 1/2 tsp almond extract

3 cups flour

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

1 cup milk

7 oz sweetened, shredded coconut (although I used unsweetened, no big deal)

Cream Cheese Icing

1 block (8oz) cream cheese, room temperature

1 1/2 sticks (3/4 cup) butter, room temperature

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 tsp almond extract

12 oz icing sugar, sifted

Directions

  1. Cream butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Add eggs one at at time and blend on low between each addition. Add the extracts and mix well.
  2. In a separate bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
  3. In 3 additions, alternately add the dry ingredients and the milk, beginning and ending with the dry. Mix until just combined and fold in coconut.
  4. Fill cupcake tins and bake at 325 for 25-35 minutes until a toothpick poked in comes out clean. Allow to cool in the pan 15 minutes, and then remove to a wire rack to cool completely.
  5. For icing, cream together cream cheese, butter and extracts. Add the icing sugar and mix until smooth.
  6. Decorate cupcakes with a sprinkle of coconut, easter candy or weird edible easter grass.

Makes 18-20 cupcakes