Red Velvet Cupcakes.

Having made Red Velvet Cupcakes before, I was pretty comfortable with this recipe. Ultimately, they turned out well, but here are some of the moments that gave me pause.



First of all, cutting off my thumb was disconcerting. Kidding. That's the red gel paste food color I used for the first time. I found that it is extremely hard to measure, though generally you use it a tiny bit at a time to color frosting and it is perfect for that. As a result of using too little, the cupcakes came out less red velvet and more brown (from the cocoa powder) with a pink-ish inside. Sort of medium-well if you choose to use meat analogies, which I do. I have already secured a promise from a friend that she will henceforth describe beef in terms of appropriate levels of red/brown in red velvet and I sincerely hope this catches on.



So this batter looked a bit light to me going in, but I wasn't going to scrape it all back into the mixer and add more color. Next time, I will most certainly be using normal red food color because half the drama of Red Velvet baked goods is the red. Anyway, Wilton bakeware is the best, and should they desire to pay me to say so, just let me know.



After I started the Cream Cheese Frosting (the best part about Red Velvet anything), I realized that once again, I was woefully unprepared and had a good deal less than the correct amount of confectioner sugar. Happily, almost all frosting recipes make up about half a pound more icing than you could ever actually use on a single recipe and MStew's recipe was no exception, so I took out an appropriate amount of cream cheese and butter and mixed it to taste with the vanilla and sugar and still had a bit left over when I was done.

My coworkers (who receive the bulk of my baked goods because once you've eaten the batter, the ones that didn't look right, and the leftover frosting, you really don't want your finished products any more and your local friends never call because they are all married or otherwise attached and thereby miss out on the baked goods because they don't care about awesome MStew-ery because who needs food when you're in love? and yes, I have issues) enjoyed them in spite of the medium-well hue, so the recipe was an overall success.



That's the massacre of my kitchen before I even started the frosting (along with a not entirely unintentional plug for my other favorite MStew book). What you see here? Roughly a third of my counterspace, not counting the ledge where I have to put all my ingredients. I have no idea what I'm going to do when I get to fondant and need an area to roll it out. Besides curse a lot and scare the cat.

So, 2 down, 173 to go. For now, it's still A Good Thing.