Caramel pear cupcakes with caramel frosting

I had some pears I needed to use so started flicking through The Flavour Bible by Karen Page and Andrew Dornenburg for some inspiration.  The Flavour Bible is a fantastic resource for any cook which contains an alphabetical list of ingredients with compatible flavours pairings.  Each pairing is ranked according to the success of the pairing – from Holy Grail pairings to recommended pairings.

Of all of the suggested pairings, I kept coming back to caramel.  Of course I already knew pears and caramel went well together, but I’d originally planned to not make anything sweet given I am home alone at the moment as my boyfriend is away with work, and didn’t want to put too much temptation in my way.  The thought of caramel and pear together was too good to resist though, so I settled on caramel pear cupcakes.

For the base of the cupcakes I settled on using a modified version of the red velvet cupcakes which I had previously successfully adapted to make spiced ginger cupcakes, and for the caramel I turned to Ina Garten’s caramel sauce recipe.  The resulting cupcakes were a success, and definitely one I will make again, next time with apple.

So, what inspires you when you are baking/cooking?  Do you look for recipes with pre-paired flavour combinations or look to your ingredients for inspiration and adapt recipes accordingly?

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