Pomegranate Cupcakes with Pom-Vanilla Bean Buttercream

While pondering if I was going to need to build an ark last week, I got an email from Kristen at POM Wonderful, asking if I was interested in a sample of their juice.
…forget flooding, I am in, now just what can I make with that?!
Of course my immediate idea was cupcakes, and obviously I went with that, but little did I know just how much POM Wonderful juice was on the way to me.
Luckily enough since I was super busy on Thursday with Petit Le Mans preparations, I didn’t get to my mailbox till around 9. Some guy was also checking his mail and saw I had a key to one of the package lockers and said to me, “I hope you got something good!” and oh boy was he right. An entire box of POM Wonderful juice. My friend Peyton and I decided to try some immediately, as neither of us had ever drank any before. By itself, it’s a bit too sweet for me, and if it wasn’t for having to wake up at 6:30am the next day to spend the day in the sun, it would have joined some vodka and club soda…which I didn’t have so it all worked out. Although as I type this, I have some iced tea with a bit of the juice in it…I hate any form of sweetness in iced tea, and I find this delicious.

Now that Petit Le Mans is finally over I am finally able to make these cupcakes. I bought a pomegranate too, just because I’d never had one. I love pomegranate flavored things, and I feel terrible for never having a real pomegranate. I will say that opening one up was one of the weirdest experiences I have had lately. The internet can only prepare you so much with how to do it and not create a disaster zone, but it’s still weird. The seeds, or arils, contain all the tasty juice, and upon eating about 24 seeds within a minute or two, I can definitely taste that POM Wonderful’s juice is entirely made from pomegranates…eating the seeds was like drinking a crunchy version of the juice. Granted, it doesn’t seem like each seed contains much juice but that wasn’t the best looking pomegranate in the world.

Now for just a bit more information on pomegranates if you’re like me: like the flavor, never had the fruit. There are a bunch of different varieties of pomegranates just like every other fruit. The wonderful variety is what POM Wonderful makes their juices out of, which also explains their name. This variety is the kind with all the antioxidants and other good stuff. POM Wonderful actually has helped with research on the effects of their juice on several health problems.

Now for the cupcakes, which probably eliminate any healthy effects, but taste amazing. I based this a bit off my Red Bull cupcake recipe since they involved quite a bit of liquid too. The batter was really airy when I was moving it from bowl to cupcake pan, and stayed that way after baking too. I sprinkled the top of each with some arils before baking, and they sunk their way down in the cake, adding for a juicy, crunchy burst of extra flavor as you eat the cake.

Pomegranate Cupcakes
2 cups All Purpose Flour
2 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 1/2 sticks of butter (3/4 cup)
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
2 eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract
1/4 cup milk
1 cup POM Wonderful pomegranate juice
Seeds from one pomegranate
(something I thought would be good to add after I made them: a tablespoon of lemon zest..something I shall try next time!)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Sift together flour, baking powder, and salt in one bowl, set aside.
Cream together butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, mixing after each addition. Add vanilla extract and milk, plus half the flour mixture. Mix together until combined. Add the pomegranate juice and other half of the flour mixture, mix together until combined.
Pour batter into prepared cupcake pan (or whatever you prefer using). Add 5-8 pomegranate seeds to top of batter. Bake in oven for 22 minutes. Let cool completely before frosting.

Pom-Vanilla Bean Buttercream

1 stick butter, softened
2 cups powdered sugar
seeds from 1/2 vanilla bean or 1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tbsp milk
1 tbsp pomegranate juice

Cream butter until fluffy. Add half the powdered sugar along with the milk, mix until combined. Add the rest of the powdered sugar, the vanilla bean seeds or extract, and pomegranate juice and beat until fluffy. Add more sugar or milk if needed for the right consistency.
Frost cupcakes, and top with more pomegranate seeds.

I ended up with 22 cupcakes (I could have filled the pan more), and this probably wasn’t enough frosting for them all, so if you’re not light with the frosting, maybe double the recipe, because it’s tasty enough to be worth doing. (I’d say increase everything by 50% but 3/4 of a vanilla bean? There’s nothing wrong with enjoying some frosting on its own.)

Get ready…

Tomorrow I am off to Road Atlanta for the next two days >:D
In case you are completely unaware of how absolutely lucky we in Atlanta are, let me tell you about Petit Le Mans.
Generally I go into shock when people tell me they have not even heard of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, which takes place yearly in Le Mans, France. There is a movie about it, thanks to Steve McQueen, and it stars the seductive sounds of a Porsche 917 (this is my opinion, you may feel it does actually star Steve McQueen). There is also a documentary out there on Audi’s battle against Peugeot called Truth in 24. Both are totally worth checking out. My goal in life is to attend the 24 Hours of Le Mans when it celebrates 100 years, which I believe would be 2023. I am staying up the whole time.
There is actually an entire racing series around Le Mans cars, with a version for 3 continents: American, European, and Asian. American Le Mans has 2 endurance races and the rest of their season consists of shorter races and of course preparation for the 24 Hours of Le Mans if a team is invited to attend. Generally, those 2 endurance races, the 12 Hours of Sebring and Petit Le Mans, also attract competitors from the other two versions of Le Mans, like Peugeot. As far as I know, the European series tends to focus on endurance races, for example they have the 1000km of Silverstone in England.

I think one of the other reasons we get the mini Le Mans race here at Road Atlanta is Don Panoz, who started the American Le Mans series, owns Road Atlanta, and of course, he also owns Panoz. Therefore obviously Road Atlanta should get the most awesome race in all of the American Le Mans series. I have only been last year and this coming year, but it is so amazing.
Anyway I should probably explain a bit more of ALMS. This description will be basically out of date next year unless it’s an endurance race. There are 2 types of cars racing in 4 different categories. The categorical differences are basically in weight and power without getting too specific here, so I will only talk about the types. First there are Le Mans Prototypes (LMP1/2), which look like these:

This is my absolute favorite team, Patron Highcroft Racing. I also own an Acura so I am a bit partial, of course, but they are an amazing team.
And Grand Touring, or GT cars, which look like these:

I like to think of GT cars as expensive cars I wish I could afford made even faster.

So they’re all out on the track at once, the LMP cars are obviously faster and they flash their headlights when they want to get around, and I truly wish my car had the blink one headlight at a time to move traffic feature. Petit Le Mans is a 10 hour/1000 mile race, whichever occurs first. During a Le Mans weekend, several other races go on: Speed World Challenge Touring and GT races, Volkswagen’s TDI Jetta Cup race, IMSA Lites, Star Mazda, GT3 Challenge, it’s RIDICULOUS how much goes on over 4 days. There is also the meet and greet with drivers, which I love, and I met Dario Franchitti last year, my mom is still jealous.

Also, this is what makes American Le Mans amazing: the series worked with the EPA and Department of Energy to become a Green Racing Series. Inside the race, there is actually another race to be the greenest. Cars use E10 fuel (what we all put in our cars), E85, biofuel diesel, and there are a couple hybrid gas/electric cars coming into play.

I love it so much, and if you have nothing to do this Saturday, come spend it at Road Atlanta. It’s about an hour from Atlanta itself, just up 85. A ticket is going to run you $60 (and another $40 for infield parking, but it’s not a difficult walk from Lanier Speedway to Road Atlanta, which is free parking) but it is entirely worth it. Granted, that is a bit much especially on a short notice, so you can also check out coverage on SPEED, which is all day this year…and come up next year

Pizza rolls and flooding, oh my!

It’s been quite a bit of time since I’ve made something worth posting about..usually I’m redoing what I’ve already done or it’s something where there really aren’t any directions. But first, it’s been raining for 7 days straight now, and it’s starting to scare me a lot.
For example, this is on the connector in downtown Atlanta.

D: Luckily where I live it hasn’t been too bad…but I am honestly too scared to go anywhere. I don’t have arm floaties.

And why should I go anywhere when I have these?!

I came across this pizza roll recipe from One Particular Kitchen on tastespotting and I almost immediately had to go buy ingredients to make them. Then I almost wanted to eat them all at once, which would lead to me running out of food…I mean not getting to enjoy these longer. Also, I hadn’t eaten pepperoni in years and the pictures on that post made me go buy some.

They’re super easy to make and taste amazing.
I got some decent pepperoni that tasted great just by itself, and chopped it up as a filling for the rolls. For dough, I just used a canned pizza crust, which worked just fine. All you do is roll out some dough, put your toppings on, roll it up, and cut it…using floss. It sounds like it won’t work, but it cuts through perfectly. No deforming happens like it would with a knife, and I think it even goes through easier.
Place them in a round pan and top them off with some cheese, and bake at 350 degrees until the cheese is melted…for me that took about 20 minutes because I wanted to make sure the crust dough baked, and it did so perfectly.

Review: Chaba Thai

Chaba Thai is one of those places that you barely notice from the outside, mainly because it’s a small spot within a rather large shopping center. Then, you walk inside and it’s somewhat awe inspiring, yet angering, since you’re going to a movie and don’t have your camera with you to document the wonder that is this beautiful fake tree, lit up in the center of the restaurant. (There is however a picture on their website of it.
We only ended up here because nothing else looked appealing, and I had kind of wanted Thai food on Thursday. I didn’t want to go somewhere else since the theatre is right there, and it wasn’t a bad choice.
The decor is very Thai, above us is a rather ornate artwork of brightly colored elephants. The music is somewhat cheesy and romantic playing behind my head, but I am still staring at that tree.
We ordered curry puffs as an appetizer and they were amazing. They are somewhat reminiscent of Indian samosas, only much smaller and less dense, and obviously with a Thai flair. They come with a sweet and sour dipping sauce, which makes them taste even better.
Thanks to that dipping sauce at Leon’s Full Service, I had to get Massaman curry here. Joe went with Panang curry of course and went with his usual specification of spice level: Thai hot, pretend I am not white. For some reason every time he tells someone he wants it really hot, they seem shocked, so he has thrown in the pretend I’m not white now. It seems to work, as when he finished eating, I heard a whimper of “ow.”
Since I ordered simply “hot,” mine wasn’t bad either. I definitely had the great feeling of my nose clearing up, and my lips were burning. The curry itself was good, the potatoes and carrots were cut in almost the same fashion as crinkle fries. The potatoes however were somewhat undercooked and it just became annoying to eat them. On one hand, I love that they didn’t just chop up vegetables like normal, but on the other I think had the potatoes been 1/3 of their size, they’d be perfectly cooked. Oddly enough, this is a recommendation from the kitchen, according to the menu.
For the price range, which is about $9-10 for noodle, rice, and curry dishes (more for squid or shrimp), it’s worth trying. I think on another visit I will go with my favorite drunken noodles. They also offer a number of specialty dishes including seafood and duck which go for nearly twice the price.

Review: Leon’s Full Service

From the moment I laid eyes on the wrench door handle on the door into Leon’s Full Service, I knew I was going to like this place. Since it was a Friday night, and we got there at about 7pm, we had to wait a bit for a table. Not really a problem, for once in several days the sun had finally been out, which meant it wasn’t raining, and it all around felt good to be outside. Joe and I went over to the bocce ball court and awaited our feet being hit by some overly excited child playing. Luckily that did not happen, every time I was certain the ball was going to bounce out and come at me, it magically was stopped by the wooden border even though it looked physically impossible.
If you are seated inside, you have to be okay with not hearing yourself think. It is loud in here. One look at the ceiling showed why that was: it was entirely wooden. The bathroom? Silent. At first it was a bit annoying but whatever, it’s hard to avoid. First thing I ordered was a glass of cider, Scrumpy’s Cider was the name, and Strongbow, I will probably never look at you the same way again. This stuff is amazing, although probably dangerous because there is absolutely no way to taste the alcohol whatsoever. Funny enough, when I was on my second glass, this place was so busy our server never noticed that I had even had a first glass. She asked me if I didn’t like it and I was like, “Are you kidding? I LOVE it!”
We started off with peppadews stuffed with goat cheese. This was good. This was so good that even in words it was good. I had gotten a text message from a friend about a minute into these things being on our table of “I’m at a diner eating jalapenos stuffed with cheddar.” I of course replied with what I was eating and the next message was of course, “that sounds way better.” I admit I went on a search for peppadews today without much luck. Just the flavor of those peppers alone was so good, and I’m not normally a fan of sweet peppers. I really could have even done without the goat cheese, but that just provided an extra bonus of flavor.
I ordered their cheeseburger, made with grass fed beef, along with pub frites and massaman curry sauce, and Joe ordered the bistro steak sandwich with the frites and the goat cheese fondue sauce. When you first look at the burger it doesn’t seem like it’s very big, and then you get started eating. I was so full, and I wasn’t expecting it at all. I’m guessing they make their own ketchup, as some different varieties are available as sauces, because normally I hate ketchup on burgers and I would have just eaten that by itself on this burger. Otherwise it wasn’t really something that stood out but that’s probably my fault for ordering a burger. (I rest all blame on my boyfriend, who told me I couldn’t order the bistro steak sandwich cause he was. And then he didn’t even offer me any of it, so I didn’t ask him how it was. I may have had to steal it if he said it was good.) The massaman curry sauce though was awesome. I don’t get massaman curry at Thai places very often, but this made me want some (that’s an entry tomorrow) or just want some made based on this sauce. I’d even say it was a better sauce than the last place I went to for curry. The goat cheese fondue wasn’t bad either. I caught Joe dipping the bread from his sandwich into it.
I would have loved to have had the liege waffle but I was so full. There is a high possibility that I will be back, making sure my stomach has the room for it.

Coca-Cola Freestyle [Wendy's in Buckhead]

I went out in the rain today to the nearest location of a Coca-Cola Freestyle machine to me: Wendy’s. The signs on the window inform you of the fantastic opportunity awaiting inside: the choice of over 100 sodas in one machine.
Now in case you haven’t heard of the magnificent new breakthrough in soda dispensers, you are missing out.
First off here’s an image from their facebook profile:

I know this doesn’t tell you much but it at least provides a visual. You pick the soda you’d like from the touch screen menu, which is already full of choices, to another menu in that subcategory with a bunch more choices. Touch again, and press the pour button.
The flavor list made me so excited that I had to go.

This was an interesting experience. I’ve had weird people on the street come up to me in Chattanooga, but I wasn’t expecting it to happen to me at Wendy’s on Peachtree Road as my first experience in Atlanta. First he seemed to think I was about to run him over, though apparently he was trying to wave me down so he could bother me for something, and then after I parked and was headed in, he started running towards me so I just went in and pulled the door shut.
Seriously, if you are in some kind of trouble, you don’t stand outside Wendy’s.
Anyway.
I ordered something just because I’m starving at this point, but I really just want soda.

I didn’t get a picture of the machine because I was kind of weirded out by the fact there was a guy here to explain the machine. There were actually 3 people but since he was the one more suggesting things I just figured the other 2 are managers of the place making sure they’ll be able to do his exciting job once he’s gone and we all go to flipping out because we’re presented with technology.
I had already decided I needed to have Raspberry Fanta Zero. As I’m on the screen to choose the flavor, he’s trying to suggest the peach flavor to me. It really kind of annoyed me because I’m always mistaken for 16, and even at 21 I think I have yet to lose that ability to understand new technology, and it’s not like they were the first to do something with a touch screen.
Although I didn’t exactly say I researched this machine all afternoon in my excitement to come here now.
But I’m not complaining…as the Raspberry Fanta poured out it smelled so good, and it tasted even better.
Now the only question remains, why did Coke put raspberry into the machine but we can’t get Raspberry Fanta elsewhere in this country? :[ In fact I looked it up on Wikipedia, the only countries that do currently have it are Hungary and Dominican Republic. And Iran has BLACKBERRY Fanta. Share that please.

Wendy’s location:

For other locations of the machines around Atlanta, head over to the Facebook fan page. They currently are in some Burger King, Subway, Wendy’s, Popeye’s, Firehouse Subs, and Willy’s locations, along with a Sam’s Club, and they seem to be installing these pretty often, so check there for updates.

Mercier Orchards: Apple Picking

LOOK AT HOW MUCH I AM UPDATING I’M SO PROUD

Anyway, this was my Saturday: picking forty apples, tasting cider, and making Joe think we’re gonna die.
I decided way back when I drove to the Tail of the Dragon that I needed to come back up to North Georgia once it was apple picking time. The amount of orchards I passed between Ellijay and Dahlonega was RIDICULOUS. I wanted an apple so bad by the time I got to Dahlonega.
However, a lot of those orchards seem to be a lot more family fun oriented, I don’t need to be paying $2 to enter just cause you have a petting zoo. So I looked around elsewhere and found Mercier Orchards. SO GLAD.
The normal way to drive to Blue Ridge from Atlanta is to take 575/515 all the way up continuing along Highway 5 until you reach the orchard, but I am too good for that…at least on the way up there. If you want some fun where you will see the people who give bicycle riders a bad name by being careless and suicidal, and you want to make yourself sick/think death is ahead in that tree or boulder, then 400 to 60 through Dahlonega till you reach Highway 5 is the way for you, as it is for me. Granted it probably helps to have a car that handles well. I wanted to test out my sway bar. Like I said, at one point Joe thought we were going to crash and die, but obviously this did not happen. In fact I didn’t even know this was his reaction until I yelled, “THAT WAS FUN!” It was, it truly was. I didn’t the rear end of my car that loose, so I don’t know why he was worried…there wasn’t a moment I was not confident in my abilities to control the car. It does start to get way to repetitive to drive around all these corners when you’re beginning to get hungry. (Take a look at a map of Highway 60 going northwest from Dahlonega…AWESOMEEEEEEEEE.) As an added bonus for a Saturday it was pretty clear once a minivan and SUV pulled off from traveling at 30mph.

So the orchard: first things first was lunch. You walk in to the most massive store of apple related things, what can only be described as “country” foods and gifts, jams, jellies, butters, honey, popcorn, candy. There is also a bakery, a chocolate counter, ice cream, and a sandwich counter. Everyone is so friendly that I really want to go back this weekend even though I don’t know what the hell I’d do with more apples. The woman at the deli counter asked us how we were enjoying everything and it was like, wow you know what? We’ve only been here for five minutes and haven’t gone past the cash registers and it’s been fantastic.
Joe got a roast beef au jus sandwich and I got a BLT. You get a side with everything: he chose their homemade apple sauce while I am boring and went with chips. I did get to try the applesauce though and it was amazing. It’s chunky, darker than that stuff that comes in a jar, and it has a really good flavor.

Cameo apples are my absolute favorite.
Now that lunch was taken care of, it was time for apple picking. A small bag is $10 and a larger bag is $15, we went with the larger bag. They give you a list of what’s ready for picking, and you go off to wait outside for a tractor, which takes you out to the orchard while someone else tells you what’s ready for picking, what’s not, why it’s not, and how to pick. They grow nearly 50 kinds of apples overall.
Of course you can taste everything while you’re out there, but I chose not to. I did end up eating a Cameo apple once we got back, and they just need some refrigerator time, because at the current stage it was like eating an apple/potato hybrid.
Joe went overboard picking Ambrosia apples, mainly because the woman we bought the bag from was selling those babies from the get go. But like I said I haven’t eaten any of them yet because I am giving them glorious, sweet crisping time.
Other varieties we picked: Golden Delicious, Smokehouse, Hampshire, Beni Shogun…I’m not even sure. I think I randomly picked a Jonagold or two, and we tried our best to separate them out later. But for sure the Golden Delicious and the Smokehouse ones are going into a pie.

As for what’s inside the store, as we had to check out, there are plenty of ciders, and you can try them all. Besides regular old cider, they have ciders from specific apples, which weren’t very good compared with the normal cider. They also have blackberry, muscadine, cherry, and peach ciders. Out of those, I only tried the blackberry cider and it was excellent. I would have tried the muscadine, but I just recently tried muscadines and I am unsure how I feel about them.
We also made sure to get the individual fried/baked pies. Apple of course is the only one you can get in the baked variety, which is what Joe got, but I went with a fried blackberry pie. I finally heated it up and ate it last night and I wish I had gotten like four more. The crust was so good, the filling even better. I can’t even imagine how good the apple must be.

Heading to Mercier is an excellent day trip for a Saturday or Sunday from either Atlanta or Chattanooga. If you want to go, you’d better hurry, I think we were told the U-Pick days were only weekends this month, and it gets busier as the month goes on. If you can’t make it up there, you can order most of the good stuff from their online store.