Go Pack Go! Green and Gold Cupcakes

Hosting a Super Bowl party is so exhausting that I had to take a break from blogging for a few days just to recuperate. After my three-day football cake ball-making marathon, I started preparations on a menu that you'd think was feeding the Packers themselves. I made an almost double batch of Badger Bits (a.k.a Bucee's Beaver Nuggets!), labored through pizza dough, supervised Bill's tomato sauce-making for the pizzas, and concocted what could have been the most delicious (but sort of complicated) cupcakes ever.

I'll give you our entire Super Bowl party menu at the bottom of this post (yeah, there's more), but first you need to hear about these cupcakes.

Go Pack Go Green and Gold Cupcakes

Ingredients:
24 of your favorite vanilla cupcakes, made from scratch or a box mix
2 cups lime curd (recipe follows)
4 cups green-tinted cream cheese frosting (recipe follows)
Yellow sprinkles

Directions:
Those of you who know me shouldn't have any doubt in your minds that I made my cupcakes from scratch. And you might be wondering why I'm not printing the recipe here. It's because I wasn't totally satisfied with my vanilla cupcake recipe, as they weren't as moist as I'd hoped they be. I'm still trying to figure out what exactly went wrong (it's one of those cases where you can make the same recipe twice but end up with two very different results). Therefore, I recommend you use a standby recipe you love, or just submit to a box mix. I won't judge.

Lime Curd
Ingredients:
3 eggs
3 egg yolks
1 stick butter, cubed
2/3 cup sugar
1/2 cup fresh lime juice

Directions:
Combine all ingredients in a large glass bowl. Set over simmering water and cook, whisking constantly for 7 to 10 minutes, until mixture is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon. (Note: The recipe I used wasn't completely accurate when it comes to cooking time. It took me 14 minutes of constant whisking to reach the right consistency. My arm got quite a workout.)

Remove bowl from pan and immediately transfer mixture to another bowl. (For extra smooth curd, pour it through a strainer.) Allow to come to room temperature, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate.

Cream Cheese Frosting
Ingredients:
8 oz. (1 block) cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened
1 teaspoon vanilla
16 oz. confectioners' sugar
Green gel food coloring

Directions:
In a large bowl, use an electric mixer to beat cream cheese and butter until creamy. Beat in vanilla. Add confectioners' sugar, a cup or so at a time, until thick and spreadable (not too stiff). Squeeze in food coloring, using enough to reach your desired shade of green). Stir until coloring is completely incorporated.

To assemble cupcakes:
Remove a 1-inch hole from center of each cupcake. (I'll let you choose whether to discard or eat those cupcake centers!) Either pipe or spoon curd into center of cupcakes. Top each cupcake with a generous amount of frosting and carefully spread to edges. Top each cupcake with yellow sprinkles.

Here's a quick product review: Last time I was at Bed, Bath and Beyond I was excited to find this little gadget they called a "cupcake plunger." In theory, you're supposed to push the plunger into the middle of the cupcake and remove the center, leaving a perfect hole in which to pipe your filling. You're also supposed to be able to fill the plunger with filling and eject it into the cupcake. Unfortunately, that plunger doesn't grab anything (cake or filling), making it impossible to remove the centers or eject any filling. Luckily it was only a waste of $3.99.

Despite the disappointing crumbly consistency of my cupcakes, these things were amazing and well worth the 14-minute curd workout. The curd seriously makes the cupcake. It's just the right amount of tart and sweet, and it's a super creamy consistency (even without straining it). The cream cheese frosting was also a genius idea, if I do say so myself. The flavor combination created a cross between cheesecake and key lime pie ... it's like having the best of both worlds in a little handheld cake!

If you have a better, more moist vanilla cupcake recipe, send it my way. I totally want to make these again (maybe with berry curd and red frosting for Valentine's Day?).

So here's the rest of our Super Bowl Sunday menu. And to provide some context, there were only four of us at the party. (Stephanie and Tiff contributed to the menu and their initials are in parentheses after their dishes. Thanks for the delicious food, guys!!)

• Badger Bits
• Chips and Homemade Salsa (S)
• Hot Crab Dip (S)
• Pretzel Crisps and Homemade Hummus (S)
• Baked Chicken Wings with Teriyaki Glaze (T)
• Fruit Salad (T)
• Sicilian Style Pizza (one cheese and one with green and yellow peppers)
• Go Pack Go Green and Gold Cupcakes
• Italian Love Cake (T)
• Poppy Seed Cookies (S)

Oh, and margaritas. Lots and lots of margaritas :)

Buc-ee's Beaver Nuggets ... or Bucky's Badger Bits?

I realize that a post on Beaver Nuggets probably requires a fair amount of background information. So here's the story: In October, I made a trip to Houston for my good friend Taryn's wedding. The wedding was actually in Wharton, Texas, a very small town ... at least by my standards. The biggest attraction in Wharton, however, is a pretty big deal. It's Buc-ee's! I suppose Buc-ee's is what you'd call a convenience store, but it's unlike any convenience store you've ever been in. They've got everything at Buc-ee's: dozens of varieties of jerky, any snack food you could ever imagine, a huge deli, an amazing bakery, country home decor (on display in the restrooms, no less), clothes, pet supplies ... and Beaver Nuggets.

If you've never experienced a Beaver Nugget, you don't know what you're missing. The best way I can describe them is as caramel-coated corn pops. And it turns out that's pretty accurate!

I came back from Houston raving about Buc-ee's and Beaver Nuggets. My co-workers couldn't believe I hadn't brought a bag back for them, but we ended up solving that problem fairly quickly. Turns out one of my co-workers has a brother who lives in Texas. And after a series of texts with his wife, she produced a recipe! Behold ... the beloved Beaver Nuggets:

Beaver Nuggets

Ingredients:
1 stick butter
1 cup brown sugar
2/3 cup light corn syrup
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 bag Chesters (Yeah, I didn't know what Chester's were either. Turns out they're corn puffs found in the chip aisle ... and they're available from brands other than Chesters. I ended up using Jay's. I saw them in both butter and cheese varieties and ended up using butter, but if you can find plain that would be even better.)

Directions:
Heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease two baking sheets. Place corn puffs in a large bowl.

In a saucepan, combine butter, brown sugar and corn syrup. Stir until sugar as dissolved. Bring to a boil, and boil for 4 minutes without stirring.

Remove from heat and add baking soda. Mixture will foam. Pour half of mixture over corn puffs and gently stir. Add remaining mixture and stir to coat. Spread corn puffs on baking sheets. (The corn puffs are somewhat fragile, so I had a tough time coating them with the sugar-syrup mixture. But it turns out that the mixture will continue to foam as it cooks in the oven, so you'll have plenty of opportunities to get them completely coated.)

Bake for 45 minutes total, stirring every 15 minutes and rotating sheets halfway through cooking time. Remove from oven, use a spatula to loosen nuggets from sheets, and allow to cool completely.

I think you need to have a Beaver Nugget to truly appreciate them. They're airy, but crunchy. Sweet, but a little bit salty. Yum!

My genius co-worker Jen (and with a name like that you should understand why she's a genius) suggested an alternate name for Beaver Nuggets, which I think we have a huge opportunity to capitalize on. Seeing as how we're in Wisconsin, where our mascot is Bucky the Badger, she's calling them Badger Bits. Brilliant! Different Bucky, same delicious snacks. I can see them being big ... and when they are, just remember that Badger Bits were born here!