Kitchen Diaries: Cinnamon Cream Cheese Frosting

Most of the time I have to plan the stuff I cook. Our kitchen isn't always well-stocked so I usually need to run to the supermarket for ingredients for the recipes I plan on making. But since I try to make muffins and cupcakes regularly I'm always stocked with the basics like flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, butter, eggs, and milk.

The ingredients I had on hand kind of decided what I was going to make next. We had two overripe bananas so it ended up being banana-flavored. I decided to throw in some of the mini chocolate pastilles Jex brought home from Perth. Since I had a 3/4 pack of cream cheese I made a cream cheese frosting with a twist. Frosting on muffins? It's cream cheese frosting, I can put it on whatever I want!

I just followed my tried and tested banana-chocolate chip muffins recipe. I put too much chocolate pastilles, though. The ratio was like 5-7 chips per muffin, which is way too much for a mini muffin. Chocolate overload!

The star of this post really is the frosting. I could have just made regular cream cheese frosting for these muffins but I wanted it to give it more flavor. I wanted something that would taste good with bananas and chocolate. Cinnamon! It sounded like a good idea. It was, it was!

I bought a smaller star tip for frosting my mini cupcakes. The ones we had were either too big or just plain round tips. But, I want pretty frosting, so there.

Cinnamon Cream Cheese Frosting

Cream cheese, room temperature	8 oz (1 pack)
Butter, room temperature	1/2 stick
Powdered sugar / confectioners' sugar, sifted	1 1/2-2 cups
Vanilla	1 teaspoon
Cinnamon	1 teaspoon (or more, if you want)
Allspice	1/2 teaspoon

1. Slice butter and cream cheese into large cubes and let sit in mixing bowl for around 30 minutes or until they come to room temperature.
2. Whisk butter and cream cheese with a mixer on med-high until fluffy.
3. Add confectioners' sugar to the mixture a half cup or so at a time. Whisk in each portion of sugar until well combined.
4. Finally, add the vanilla, cinnamon, and allspice. Whisk on med-high for a few minutes until light and fluffy.

I usually only put around 1 1/2 cups of sugar for cream cheese frosting because my mom doesn't like it too sweet. I like it that way, too, since you get to taste the cream cheese more. The downside is that the frosting doesn't become stiff enough to keep a specific shape. I actually ran out of cinnamon and only had around half a teaspoon left for the frosting. I used a bit of cinnamon sugar to compensate. You can use more cinnamon and allspice if you want the frosting to have a stronger flavor.

This recipe makes enough to frost around 30 mini muffins/cupcakes. What's do you do with extra frosting? More frosting for the muffins, of course!