Red Velvet Cupcakes

I'm back!! After 3 months of traveling around and spending time with family, I'm finally back at home (I have multiple homes. Yes I'm a nomad.) Which means I can bake again! I did bake a few times when I was in the Philippines but it was all old stuff -- Snickerdoodles, Chocolate Cupcakes, Apple Crisp -- stuff that are already up on this blog.

I had a day to kill before school started so I thought I'd bake some cupcakes. I've tasted some reaaally good red velvet cakes and cupcakes in the past so I wanted to make my own. As with everything else, my favorite part is always the frosting -- cream cheese frosting.. mmm yummy.

These cupcakes turned out a little dry so I'm gonna have to tweak it next time. But anywho, here's the recipe.

Makes 12 medium-sized cupcakes.

Red Velvet Cupcakes

1/4 cup butter, softened
3/4 cup white sugar
1 egg
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 tblspoon red food coloring
1/2 tsp vanilla
3/4 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 tsp vinegar
1 cup flour
2 tblspoons unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 tsp salt

• Preheat oven to 175˚C.
• Cream together butter and sugar.
  
• Add egg, buttermilk, red food coloring, and vanilla to the mix.
  ** I had no buttermilk so I put 1 tablespoon of vinegar in a mixing cup and filled the rest with milk until the 1-cup mark. Use half of this for the recipe. **

• Mix in baking soda and vinegar to the batter.
• In a separate bowl, combine flour, cocoa powder and salt.
  
• Slowly add the dry ingredients to the other bowl. Mix well.
• Pour batter into cupcake cups until they are half full.
• Place in the oven for 10 minutes.

Cream Cheese Frosting

1/2 of an 8oz. cream cheese block, softened
2 tblspoons butter, softened
1/2 cup icing sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla

• Cream together cream cheese and butter.
• Add vanilla and mix well.
• Slowly add icing sugar.

** Remember to cool cupcakes completely before adding the icing because it will melt.

Yummy Rating:
♥
(It was a little dry.. and not as red as I wanted it to be.)

Chocolate Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Swirl

Recipe from Black Bottom Cupcakes I.

These cupcakes turned out really moist! The chocolate cupcakes I made before were super dry compared to this. Instead of cream cheese frosting, there's a cream cheese filling in the middle of the cupcake. I think I put too little because you can't really taste the cream cheese part.

I didn't have a cupcake pan or cupcake liners so these are brand new. I bought 100 pieces of cupcake cups for only 6 pesos (C$0.13!!) and the pan for about 150 pesos (C$3.50). Really cheap! Have to remind myself to buy tons of baking stuff before I go back to Vancouver.

Yummy Rating:
♥♥♥
(I didn't really like it but other taste-testers did!)

Vanilla Brown Butter Cupcakes

Recipe from BakingBites.

When I was working at Maxxam (for my first 2 co-op terms), they held a competition to fundraise for the Vancouver Food Bank. All the employees were split into 7 or 8 different teams. At the end, my group came in 3rd place. We raised about $700 (if I remember correctly) by having a pizza lunch, clubbing night, 50/50 draw, and a bunch of bake sales! This was my contribution to one of our bake sales.. I think I sold them for 50cents per cupcake.. cus they were mini ones.

Yummy rating:
♥♥

Oreo Cupcakes

Got the recipe for this from Baking Bites.

I added some crushed cookies to the frosting so it wouldn't taste so plain..

So there's crushed cookies in the batter, in the frosting, and on top of the cupcake. Oreo overload much? Naah.

Yummy Rating:
♥♥♥
(out of 3)