Baking Addiction Wednesday; Pink Lemonade Cupcakes.

So I've spent the last few Wednesday's being able to get back into baking, I actually forgot how much I enjoyed it, and it was a happy fluke that I rediscovered the fun. You see my mom has a long standing Wednesday date with Little Bird.  For the past month in a half she has come over to spend time with her granddaughter freeing up my hands and giving me a little bit of a break.  A few weeks ago I promised to make my Mother her favorite cupcakes if she brought me the ingredients, then the next week I decided to make cupcakes again, and now it is becoming a tradition (so it looks like).

I figured I would share some of those baked goods on here, well pictures of them and the recipes at least and from now on Wednesday will be known as Baking Addiction Wednesday.

Pink Lemonade Cupcakes

 

So yes I admit that I cheat, that is a box of cake mix.  Sometimes it's just easier to doctor a pre made mix then make it from scratch.  So here is a list of the substitutions.

• Instead of oil that is called for on the box, I unused two sticks of butter (yeah I know it’s not very healthy but it is good tasting).
• The back of the box called for three eggs but I threw in an extra two.
• I used half and half instead of water, but usually I use whole milk as the substitute (didn’t have any at the time).
• Added a few drops of pink gel coloring just to brighten the color
• And added just a little bit of lemon zest (this you can pretty much just add as little or as much as you want, I didn't measure), and about a tablespoon of fresh squeeze lemon zest.

I creamed the butter until light and paled in color before adding the eggs one at a time, not adding the next until the last was completely incorporated into the mix. After that I added the half and half and continued to mix for about a minute.  Then I just dumped in the dry mix beating it until rich and fluffy with a texture more like mouse than batter.  Easily spooned into paper lined cupcake tins.

 

After following the directions on the box when it came to temperature and bake time (I believe it was 350 for 18 to 20 minutes).  The cupcakes came out uber fluffy and once cooled deflated a little bit, kind of like souffles do, but not quite as badly.

The only thing next to do was make the frosting, I went with a French Buttercream, I got the recipe for it over at The Kitchn.

The only thing I did that was different was about two tablespoons lemon juice and a bit of zest (again totally optional but I wanted to give it just that extra lemon flavor).  Follow the recipe directions to the letter though, I made the mistake of not doing so and had to add a little bit of powdered sugar to stiffen it and even then I had a hard time getting the frosting to stay onto the cupcake, while the frosting was room temperature I dipped each frosted cupcake into sweetened coconut shavings to give it a snowball look.  The texture approved greatly though after the frosted cupcakes where refrigerated.

This is the finished project.  Out of the two dozen I made I only kept two (one for my husband and one for myself) the rest left with my mom, and they were supper yummy.  This one recipe is a keeper for sure.