Fancy Puto

Puto is a staple meryenda food for Pinoys. I toyed with the idea of fancying it up to mimic a cupcake. You know, like Sonja’s cupcakes that everybody is raving about. I’ve yet to visit Sonja’s at the Serendra in The Fort, but I will one of these days. For the moment, I tried making my own buttercream puto to compensate my cupcake craving. The result, yummy! The downside, buttercream puto can’t be served hot. Anyhoo, this is just okay since cupcakes with frostings aren’t served hot either.



Puto (makes 22 medium-sized puto)





2 cups all purpose flour
1 ½ tbsp baking powder
1 ½ cups milk
1 ½ tbsp vanilla
2 eggs
1 cup sugar
grated cheese
add a drop of yellow food color if desired



Mix all dry ingredients and set aside. Beat eggs and mix with milk and vanilla. Gradually add the dry ingredients until mixture is soft and creamy. Pour into greased muffin pan and steam for 5-10 minutes. Remove puto from the mold and cool.





Buttercream Frosting (enough to lightly cover 22 puto)







½ stick butter
½ cup sugar
¼ cup milk



Beat butter until creamy. Gradually add sugar and milk, and continue beating until mixture forms spikes. If you don’t have an electric mixer (like me) a good old wire whisk will do (with extra effort of course).