Martha Stewart (Encouraging Animals to Remain) Living

I love cupcakes. In June, the Martha Stewart Show celebrated these tiny confections with the reverence they deserve. During what I'll refer to as "Cupcake Week", she invited the mastermind behind Trophy Cupcakes in Seattle (not vegan). After watching her make these Chocolate Graham Cracker Cupcakes with Toasted Marshmallow (follow the link for the recipe and video), I had to veganize them.

Veganizing this was pretty easy, I basically used the most straight forward replacements.

• For the eggs, EnerG Egg Replacer (if you try something different, tell me how it turns out)
  
• For the whole milk, soy milk with 1 tbsp apple cider vinegar (to help it curdle a little)
• For the butter, non dairy margarine (I usually use Earth Balance Buttery Sticks)
• For the marshmallow topping, vegan marshmallow mix (see below)

If I'm missing something or you have any questions, let me know. These cupcakes were too good not to share.


Cupcake prep: graham cracker crust plus bittersweet chocolate.


Here they are ready to go in the oven with a fresh sprinkling of graham crackers and chocolate.


Here's a gorgeous picture of the little babies fresh out of the oven.


My version of marshmallow topping... actual marshmallow. My topping came out super delicious, but the cake was moist and chocolatey and could pretty much stand on its own, if you're feeling lazy. You may notice that I did not toast the topping. I'm afraid of torches. It's mainly that devilish blue flame.





Check out that awesome graham crackery cupcake crust.

Wait...The Temperature is OVER Twenty Degrees?

Ah, spring. That magical time of year when flowers bloom, the tax refund rolls in, and I am overwhelmed by the urge to do this is front of a mortified crowd.

Yes, spring is the thing for dance-offs, groove-outs, and all-around popnlockbauchery. It only makes sense that I spend the season on a constant hunt for unstoppable new dance anthems (I call them dancethems because I'm hip and brilliant).

We're off to a great start! First off, we have a crossover star who will drop jaws worldwide with THE song for this era of rage and impatience:




Blog 'Scuse Me has received word that an O'Reilly-Justice collabo is in the works!

The jams can't stop when I leave the club. Fresh beats have to permeate all areas of my life. Which is why I've queued up some Hammerman, which existed in the good old days when cartoons had 17 minute intros and living large equalled bogarting your cousin's Gameboy and scoring a sip of Pepsi at a classmate's birthday party:




Let's not forget one of this decade's most grating staples of the dance music pantheon - sampling video game soundtracks. I say djs should just lift entire original pieces from video games and blast them. Why mess with greatness? I would go insane if I was grapevining in the club and suddenly heard the theme from any level of Little Nemo: The Dream Master .



Is it sad or encouraging that with all the Wiis and whose-a-wuts-ems and robotic virtual ticka-bobs emptying wallets right now, I still prefer the magical simplicity of a Bush Sr.-era 2D side-scroller? All I know is I friggin love *Orioto and am jonesing for prints...

Let the Wild Rumpus Start

Last week, the long-awaited trailer for Spike Jonze's "Where the Wild Things Are" was released and it's already more popular than that hamster eating carrots on youtube. Being that this was one of my favorite books as a child and since every other blog, internet news site, and frickin' twitter has said something about this movie, I figured we needed to get in on this.

Actually, what has interested me most about this movie in the past few days has been the soundtrack. I was lured in by the sounds of Arcade Fire's "Wake Up" and even more intrigued by the mention of Karen O and Carter Burwell. After endless searches to find out more information than what I could figure out for myself in the last few frames of the trailer, I ended up at... mtv.com? And actually there is a carbon copy of the same article on vh1.com, if you're too good to go to mtv for your news. (Note: by "endless searches" I mean about 30 minutes of casual googling while I ate lunch.)

MTV on Karen O and Carter Burwell:
...O's name is listed in the just-released "Wild Things" trailer, alongside musician Carter Burwell, who has scored all of Jonze's previous feature films as well as a little film you might have heard of called "Twilight."

On Arcade Fire:
A spokesperson for the Fire told MTV News that he was reaching out to them for comment on "Wild Things" and their involvement with the film but had received no answer by press time. He did, however, confirm to MTV News that the version of "Wake Up" featured in the trailer was "a new version, re-recorded specifically for the film," so perhaps the band didn't just stop there.

Now I have one problem with this article. Carter Burwell is known for his work with the Coen Brothers, right? He's like the Angelo Badalamenti to their David Lynch? Okay, maybe I'm stretching it. But you're telling me that the kids today would know Twilight over The Big Lebowski? Baffling!

Actually, according to Wikipedia (which is where I get all my information), he scored the Buffy the Vampire Slayer movie and has just now made it to the top ten of my awesome list.

So before I go off on a further tangent, here's the trailer for Where the Wild Things Are:

Cookies are Awesome!

It's no secret. I love cookies. I just polished off a couple c chip cooks as I started this post. Well, this morning over coffee and reading another article about the looming subway fare hikes, I noticed a new post on the Post Punk Kitchen blog. Basically a blitzkrieg of amazing cookie photos in anticipation of the new Isa Chandra Moskowitz/Terry Hope Romero cookbook. I am beyond excited. Blog 'scuse me? is definitely having a cookie party after this book comes out. The idea of putting pretzels in a cookie just blows my mind and those peanut butter pillows look dreamy.



The Crimson Velveteen Cupcakes from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World (with blue food coloring instead of red) Sooooooo delicious.

Miley, Like... Come On, Seriously

After the events of the past year, Blog 'Scuse Me has decided that pop stars need a little familial advice - after all, pop stars are the cotton-candy-scented, coke-snorting siblings we wish we had. With recent news of miscreant musicians Radiohead snubbing the cherubic Disney-owned pop idol Miley Cyrus, we decided it was time to step in and help out these poor, innocent, drug-addled starlets.

Here are some ideas that our sweet little Miley can use to ruin Thom Yorke and his ragamuffin group of scoundrels:

• Rig Radiohead's Tivos to record nothing but Hannah Montana.
  

• Creep into Jonny Greenwood's house while he sleeps and style his hair into an exact replica of Billy Ray's circa-1993 permed mullet.

• Buy all the tickets for their next show. Fill it with your Disney Channel drones. Coach them to chant "Miley!" until Radiohead agrees to meet with you. (Costly, but effective. We've used this method a couple of times, and it's always worked.)

• Purchase rights to the music video for Paranoid Android. Tweak animation so the guy in the hat is playing table tennis with Taylor Swift instead of an angel. Debut remastered video at next Amsterjam festival. Drink lots of Heineken while you're there and tell people Thom Yorke bought it for you.

• Start a coalition against the Featured Artist Coalition.

Note from Monica (Senior Jem Analyst): I recognize that Hannah Montana is an homage to Jem and the Holograms, i.e. a weak carbon copy minus the science. Here are some schemes I learned from watching the show:

• Try to discover Thom Yorke's true identity.

• Use an orphan to lure Jonny Greenwood away right before a show and while Radiohead is busy looking for Jonny frame them for stealing the money from the concert.

• Convince Billy Ray to buy the movie studio making the film Radiohead is starring in (first get them to star in a film, preferably directed by McG, who with a firm but loving hand guided Crispin Glover to stardom in a role with no dialogue that required a dignity-free death scene). Then seize control of the film and add yourself to the cast.

• Anonymously report that Radiohead is mistreating their orphans.

• Compete in a battle of the music stars.

Miley, you are the real victim here. If you don't speak up, what other pop star is a Grammy award-winning band going to snub next time? Because we don't think Lady GaGa could take it.

And 1987 Begat Gibbler...

Blog 'scuse me is headed to an 80s-themed birthday party this weekend. My thought upon receipt of the invitation was, "I want nachos," and then, once I had eaten some nachos, "What will I wear to this party?"

To get some outfit ideas, I recalled the two most impactful groups that emerged in the Reagan era: yuppies and the cast of Full House. Three-piece suits are confining, so I soon decided I would dress as a random fifth-grade chum of Kimberly Gibbler, aka the greatest sitcom sidekick to come along since Joey Gladstone.

I slapped a WWKGD sticker on my fridge and got to work. What would Kimmy's friend have needed to stay warm as she and Kimmy were tossed out of the Tanner house on a frosty January morning?

These canary yellow mothereffers:

And what hairstyle would Kimmy's buddy have needed to rock as she bounced around DJ's room screaming Go-Gos lyrics into a hairbrush?

Heeeere we go. "HUSH MY....DARRRLING...."

Toss in a neon pink shirt-dress and you have the look so far. Jewelry, barrettes, and shoes are next in Operation TGIF Buffoonery. I'll keep you posted, against your will; just the way Kimmy would want it.

We're Back! A Blogosaur Story

What better way to kick off this frosty New Year's Eve than to announce our triumphant return to Blog 'scuse me? A combination of relocating, lack of collaborations between Korn and Lil' Wayne, and getting turned down by Michael Phelps for an intimate interview had forced us into hiding. Now we've returned to delight and terrify and we've brought pictures of cookies from The Lost Cookie Party. We know that you all have been salivating to see the product of our November Cookie Party. Now we're debuting the lost pictures from that magical sugar-dusted night. Our hope is that if and when you encounter us on the street you grab us by the lapels and demand the recipes for the gooey confections below.



Our scrumptious c chip cooks in their doughy infantile stage before they are thrown into a 350F hell box.


Here the chips are at that perfect melty chocotastic phase.


Here we plop some preserves into the squishy adult hamster size balls of dough that will become linzer torte.


The finished product - the inclusion of sea salt made this sort of like a chubby potato chip with blackberry topping. Yummo! (copywrite 2002 Rachel Ray)


Palm Trees fresh from the oven. Apparently, you bake the cooks before you ice them. It only took us our second try to get that right. Lesson learned.


A sparkly sweet treat for Santa's pre-Christmas retreat to Aruba.


A Special Gift for the Holidays
Apparently, Mariah Carey Carey, the science community is not impressed by your glass cracking soprano and quick marriage to Nick Cannon.