Pears and Caramel

So my grandparents gave me some fresh pears last week so I just had to make some cupcakes out of them. I found a great recipe here for apple cupcakes with caramel frosting and just changed them to pear. They were really good, but I'd love to find some way to really amp up the pear taste. A lot of the people who tried them didn't realize they were pear.

Pear Cupcakes

1 cup brown sugar

1 cup sugar

3 cups peeled, chopped pears

3 cups flour

2 teaspoons baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon ground cloves

1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1 cup butter, melted

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

Heat oven to 350 degrees.

Combine the brown and white sugars; toss with the apples and set aside. Whisk together the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg. Stir the melted butter into the apple mixture. Beat in the eggs. Beat in the flour mixture just until combined. Add extracts.

Pour batter into cupcake pan and bake until cake tests done (around 20 min). Allow to cool before frosting.

Caramel Frosting

1/2 cup unsalted butter

1 cup packed dark brown sugar

1/4 cup milk

2 cups sifted powdered sugar

Melt butter in saucepan over low heat. Add brown sugar and milk. Bring to boiling, stirring to dissolve sugar. Remove from heat. Cool.

Beat confectioners’ sugar into milk mixture until smooth. If the frosting seems too thick, add a little more milk, or cream, a little at a time until the frosting is of a good, spreadable consistency.

I made a mistake and put my frosting in the fridge for a bit after it was finished because it seemed a little liquidy. Then it became the consistency of fudge. So I had to remix it and add more milk but, in the end, it turned out fine.