Browned butter cupcakes with apricot cream cheese icing

The big apricot festival cooking contest is over.  I did not win but I had a lot of fun and a lot of ideas for next year.  These are my new favorite!!

Ingredients

• 1/3 cup butter, softened
• 1 1/3 cups all purpose flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 cup sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 3/4 cup milk
• 
  
• Frosting:
• 1 8 oz package of cream cheese softened
• 1 stick butter softened
• 1/2 cup apricot preserves
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 3 1/2 cups powdered sugar
• 
  

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 350F. Line a 12-cup muffin pan with paper liners.
2. Melt butter in a small saucepan and cook over low-medium heat until butter has turned an amber color and smells toasty, but not burnt. Butter will darken quickly once it begins to turn. Pour from saucepan, scraping all the browned bits from the bottom with a spatula, into a small bowl to cool.

3. In a large bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, salt and sugar.

4. In a medium bowl, whisk together cooled butter, eggs, vanilla and milk. Pour into flour mixture and stir until just combined.

5. Distribute batter evenly into prepared muffin cups. I made them too big and only got 11 instead of 12.  Lol.

6. Bake for 16-19 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center of a cupcake comes out clean.

7.Cool completely on a wire rack before frosting.

For the Frosting:



1. Mix Cream Cheese and Butter in a medium sized bowl using an electric mixer until creamy.

2. Add vanilla extract and mix well.

3. Add half the apricot preserves until well mixed. Add half the powdered sugar and mix well, alternate between the preserves and the powdered sugar until the frosting is at a good spreading consistency,

I piped the icing on using a piping bag with no tip, sprinkled with some dried apricots and topped with an orange Wilton icing flower.