Cupcakes: The Best Way To Celebrate the End of the Semester!

With the semester over, I now have a little bit more time to myself. Not a lot, but it's an improvement form my hectic semester. For months now, whenever I go to the gym, the trainers there (including mine) incessantly ask when I am going to bake for them. My answer is always the same: when I am not buried with school work! 

Well, now that I am on winter break, I am no longer buried with school world, so I decided to surprise the trainers with carrot cake (their favorite, apparently) and some cupcakes. I make really tasty red velvet cupcakes, if I do say so myself, however, after visiting a couple of grocery stores and even Party City, I was unable to find red food coloring! Can you believe it? Undeterred, I decided to make my red velvet cupcakes anyway, just without the food coloring. I am pleased to say, even though they looked like snicker doodles, they tasted exactly the same as my red velvet cupcakes! 

Ingredients for Cupcakes:

- 4 tablespoon unsalted butter, at room temp

- 3/4 cup granulated white sugar

- 1 egg

-2.5 tablespoon unsweetened cocoa powder

-3 tablespoon red food coloring (optional)*

- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

- 1/2 cup buttermilk**

- 1 & 1/4 cup all purpose flour

- 1/2 teaspoon salt

- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda

- 1.5 teaspoon distilled white vinegar

*If you want red velvet cupcakes, add food coloring. If the color doesn't matter, don't worry about the food coloring. They will taste the same. 

**Alternatively, you can simply mix a 1/2 cup whole milk + half a lemon and let sit for a few min. This is usually what I do, in lieu of buying buttermilk. It works just as well and I think it's more practical.

This recipe is my modified version of the Hummingbird Bakery recipe. 

Ingredients for Cream Cheese Icing:

- 4 tablespoon butter

- 2 cups powder sugar

- 8 oz cream cheese

- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract

This icing is great if you make the traditional red velvet cupcakes.

Ingredients for Nutella Icing:

- 4 tablespoon butter

- 1/2 cup powder sugar

- 1/2 cup nutella

For this batch of non red velvet cupcakes, I went with a nutella icing. You can play around with the ingredient quantities, depending on how sweet you want the icing. 

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 350F.

2. Prepare your buttermilk by mixing the milk and lemon together. Place to the side.

3. Place softened butter in a bowl. (I will sometimes throw the butter in the microwave for a couple seconds to soften it.) 

4. Add sugar to butter. Mix and make sure that the sugar and butter blend together. You will get a pale crumbly yellow mixture. 

5. Add the egg to the butter-sugar mixture. Mix. Once the egg is mixed in, set the bowl aside. 

6. In a large bowl, add the cocoa powder and vanilla extract. Mix until you get a chocolate syrup. 

If you are making red velvet cupcakes, also add the food coloring and mix until you get a paste. 

7. Add the egg-butter-sugar mixture to the chocolate mixture. Mix well.

8. Next, add half of the flour. Mix well.

9. Add half of the buttermilk and mix well. 

10. Add remainder of flour and mix. Then add the remainder of buttermilk and mix. 

11. Add the baking soda and salt. Mix well.

12. Finally, add the vinegar and mix well. 

13. Set up a cupcake baking tray with cupcake liners. (This can also be done ahead of time. Totally up to you). 

14. Fill each cupcake liner half way with butter. As they bake in the oven, the cupcakes will rise to the top!

Let the cupcakes bake in the oven for about 20 minutes or until you can insert a toothpick into the cupcakes and it comes out clean. 

15. Once the cupcakes are done, let cool for 10 minutes (or so) before transporting to wire rack. 

Whilst the cupcakes are cooling, this is an ideal time to make the icing, whatever icing that may be. As I mentioned above, for these cupcakes, I decided to go with a nutella icing. The icing came out a little sweet for my taste, but the trainers really liked it and they went really well with the cupcakes!