Catching up once more! I've been working on perfecting what has become my all-time favorite cupcake--Maple! The first picture is of the original maple cupcake recipe (with "fluffy maple frosting"). This recipe called for nutmeg as well as real maple syrup. I'm not a big fan of nutmeg, apparently, and the real maple syrup is expensive, so while these were good, they weren't AWESOME. However, I *LOVE* the maple frosting! I think I'd eat rocks if they were coated in this frosting. So, in an attempt to find the perfect cupcake to be topped with maple frosting, I set out experimenting. I tried it on top of plain vanilla cupcakes, which was good but not perfect, and then I created Vanilla Maple cupcakes. The first version didn't have quite enough maple flavor to the actual cupcake, but the most recent incarnation (5th picture) was perfect! Definitely my favorite.
The second picture is a basic Chocolate cupcake with chocolate buttercream frosting, made for a birthday party. I used the regular chocolate frosting recipe instead of my "non-milk chocolate" lighter one and I wasn't as happy with it. I guess maybe for chocolate lovers, it'd be good, but I think I'd probably make the "not-milk chocolate" be my standard chocolate frosting because I like it better!
Third is a tray of Golden Vanilla cupcakes with lemon buttercream frosting (first attempt). These got rave reviews at the playdate I made them for, as did the Golden Vanilla with maple frosting!
The fourth picture is what I'm calling "Pink Lemonade"--lemon cupcakes with lemon buttercream frosting (second attempt, I prefer this version!). I've avoided using food coloring because I think the customer base we're looking at (vegan, health conscious, allergic) often includes those who avoid artificial colors, but my daughter requested pink "fairy cakes" for her birthday party, so that's what I made! I'd like to find a natural food coloring option to use instead, I just haven't looked into it much yet. The fifth picture was also for this birthday party, my final Vanilla Maple version with fluffy maple frosting. Both flavors also got rave reviews from everyone at the party!
I too was looking for natural alternatives to food colors during birthday season and found a few: India Tree (available through amazon and other places) and Nature's Flavors (available at naturesflavors.com). Both are pricey and as they're veggie/fruit/plant derived, they can influence the flavor if you're trying to get intense colors. My final solution for pink, which worked like a charm: drop by drop of juice from pureed beets. Beautiful pink color achieved far before you get into the taste-of-beets territory.
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