Tin Foil Soldier

So the idea to cook with apple cider came to me when I at some point saw something for about Apple Cider Donuts. I have never had an apple cider donut, but they sounds awesome.

I don’t deep fry things so I decided on cupcakes because they are easy to take to work. The first time I made them I made the cake from scratch, which I have never done before, and I learned alot of lessons.

This time I used a Better Crocker Spice Cake mix, and added to it as I saw fit.

First I took probably 2 cups of apple cider and put it in a sauce pan.

I added my satchel of Mulled seasonings (orange peel, whole cloves, allspice berries, bits of cinnamon stick)

mulled it for a while

then I removed the satchel (letting it cool and putting it back in a glad bag in the freezer to use again)

now I brought the mulled cider to a boil and reduced it until I had about 1 cup of liquid.

The cake mix calls for 1 1/4 cups water, so I added cider to the reduction until I had 1 1/4 cups, and then I added some chunky apple sauce for good measure. It was probably 1 1/3 cups till I was done.

Next the recipe mix (it doesn’t really deserve “recipe” if it is the default method to prepare the mix) calls for 1/3 cup of oil.  I don’t like using all oil, so I ended up with 1/4 cup oil and 1/4 cup chunky apple sauce.  Yes, I know they are supposed to be interchanged 1-1, ask me if i care.

Anyway.  while this was mixing in said glorious KitchenAid Stand Mixer, I was re-creating the mulled cider reduction from earlier, but this time I kept reducing it.  I eventually added 4 tbs of cane sugar and kept reducing.

Into the oven the cupcakes went, in papers of course.

I timed it so that the cider was somewhere between soft ball and firm ball when the cupcakes were coming out of the oven.

I brought one pan out at a time so I could brush the tops with the cider glaze while they were still super hot (last time I waited too long and it just didn’t work right)

They turned out awesome.

We ate them all, so no pictures.