Under Construction: I made Cupcakes!!

Tonight I made cupcakes. I searched online for a very long time to find the "perfect recipe." I finally narrowed it down to the recipe I was going to use. I was wanting a dense cupcake--not a light and fluffy box cupcake. And I wanted a fluffy butter cream frosting on top. They turned out to be everything I imagined they'd be. :)

I thought I'd share the recipe with you guys...

Vanilla Texas Sheet Cake

2 2/3 Cup flour

2 Cup sugar

1/2 Cup butter

1/2 Cup oil

1 Cup water

2 Eggs

2 Tsp vanilla

1 Tsp cinnamon (I skipped this)

1 1/2 Tsp baking soda

2/3 Cup buttermilk (I used regular milk and added vinegar)

In large mixing bowl, combine flour and sugar. Set aside. Bring butter, oil and water to a boil in a saucepan. Pour boiling mixture over flour and sugar mixture. Beat thoroughly. Beat in the rest of the ingredients. Pour into paper lined cupcake pans. Bake at 350 for about 13 minutes.

Butter cream frosting

1 cup butter

6-8 cups powdered sugar

1/2 cup milk

1 tsp vanilla

Beat all ingredients together. Add more powdered sugar to thicken, and milk to thin.

I wanted half of my cupcakes to be pink, but since I don't eat food coloring, that was going to be hard. First I tried strawberry jam...

It didn't really change the color at all, but it did add a very soft strawberry flavor--it's really yummy!! The downfall? ...strawberry seeds in my frosting.

Next I tried beet juice. I added 1 tablespoon of the juice (as I only wanted a soft pink color)

It added NO flavor, but the color turned out just as I wanted it to.

Shayden was my big helper.

I'm not sure who was more excited about these cupcakes...him or me :)

Getting ready to be frosted!!

I wanted the frosting to be thick and moundy on top. (Moundy is my new word!!) So I cut the edge of a plastic zip lock bag off and stuck a frosting froster tip in it and screwed it on. Had the frosting been thicker, it would have worked very well.