Green Tea Cake & Cupcakes

Preheat oven to 325-350 degrees. Grease and flour 2 cake pans. [I usually butter the bottoms and sides of the pan, and then sift flower over the buttered pan insides using a meshed flour sifter]

In a medium size bowl, combine all the dry ingredients and mix with a spatula till well combined

In your largest bowl, beat sugar, oil, and eggs together with an electric beater/mixer until smooth.

Beat the flour mixture into the wet mixture, alternating with the yogurt. Mix till just incorporated. Pour batter into the 2 pans. If you are making a 6 in cake, put cupcake liners in the cupcake pan and then pour the rest into a cupcake pan.

Bake until golden brown. Do the toothpick test: If the toothpick inserted at the center of the cake/cupcake comes out clean, it is ready. Usually bake for 30-40 minutes, but check back every 15 min to make sure nothing burns.

Place on wire rack to cool for 1/2 hour, and then remove the cake and cupcakes from the pan. To remove cake, place it on a cutting board and invert the cake. The cake should slide out of the pan easily because you buttered and flowered the pan

Before icing the cake, let the baked cakes and cupcakes chill overnight in your fridge, or at least a few hours so it is cold.

Sift confectioner's sugar, green tea powder in a small bowl.

In a large bowl, beat butter, milk, and cream cheese together. Add the sugar and green tea mix gradually, and beat till smooth.

Torte the cake if you want a 2-layer cake to look like it has 3 layers. This means using a cake leveler to slice each of the two layers into half.

Use the icing to assemble the cake layers, and then use a large cake-decorating spatula to do a crumb coat. This means a quick layer of icing (no need for perfection) that covers all the crumbs so they don't pop up into your final outer icing. Place cake in fridge to chill for 30 min so crumb coat icing can seal all the crumbs in.

Place cake on a cake turn-table, and ice the rest. The best way to ice a cake is to start from the top, and then move on to the sides (in my opinion). Put on a lot of icing at first, and then use your flat spatula to scrape away as you turn the cake turn-table for a smooth finish. A great video on cake icing can be found here. The sides of this cake don't need to be perfectly flat, because you are going to cover them with chocolate swirl rods anyways.

Cut chocolate swirl rods with a knife (cut fast so you do not crack the rod, which is brittle) so that the pieces are the same height as your cake. Place rods side-by-side on cake.

Put 2 Ferrero Rocher chocolates in the center of the cake. Lean 2 chocolate swirl rods (uncut length) against the chocolates. To help the two rods stick together, you can add some green tea icing in between the rods where they meet. Don't add too much icing, or else it'll show on the rods. Place chocolate chocolates around the rods and chocolates in any pattern you like.

Fill a pastry bag, with Wilton tip 2110 at the front (any large star tip will do).

Pipe a swirl on the cupcakes. Place the swirl a bit inside the cupcake edge, so the icing does not slide off the side of the cupcake.

Take a small piece of chocolate swirl cookie, and put it on top of the cupcake.