White Cupcakes with Lemon Buttercream (Caroline)

Not all cupcakes made from a boxed mix are equal, so here are some tips for getting good cupcakes from a boxed cake mix, or even cupcakes that you make from scratch. 

Whip the cake mix. Don't over-whip it, but when I use my kitchen-aid, I whip it on med/high for about 30 seconds and then turn the power to the highest setting for about 10 seconds. 

Use cupcake liners. I made cupcakes without liners once... 

Fill your cupcake liners evenly. This is hard. It took me forever to get the hang of this, but this is how you get cupcakes that puff up above the liners juuuust a bit without overflowing. Like I said in my last post, I usually get 18 cupcakes per box. So if the number you end up with isn't within the 16-20 range, your cupcakes are probably going to be too big or too small. The box says to fill the cupcake liners 2/3 full, but I fill mine closer to 3/4. To see if you have more batter in one liner than in another, get on your knees or squat down and look at the cupcakes from more of a horizontal perspective. From this perspective, it's a lot easier to see how much empty/full space you have in each cupcake liner. 

I bake my cupcakes closer 325 degrees Fahrenheit, rather than the 350 that the box recommends. 

Don't open the oven while your cupcakes are baking until after they've baked for about 15-18 minutes at least. If you open the oven before then, you risk cupcake craters. 

Set your timer for 15 minutes. Check your cupcakes. Bake for only 1 or 2 minutes at a time from then until they're how you want them. For these white cupcakes I made last week, I left the first pan in for 18 minutes and they got a bit dark around the edges, but and I took the second pan out after 16 minutes and the tops were still gorgeous and white and hadn't started browning yet. This is how I think white cake should be. 

Remove cupcakes from your cupcake pan to keep them from continuing to bake after you've taken them out of the oven. If you took your cupcakes out slightly early, this isn't a big deal, but if you took them out when they were just on the brink of being too overdone, then you'll want to remove them from the pan. If I'm feeling invincible, I just used my hands, but usually I take two spoon to lift each cupcake out. 

Lemon Buttercream: 

Just following up the last cupcake post with a lemon variation on my butter-cream recipe. It's the same recipe as the butter-cream I used on the butterfly cupcakes, I just added 2 tsp fresh lemon juice and a little more powdered sugar (like half a cup-ish) to compensate for the extra liquid. This turned out to not be quite lemony enough for me, so next time I think I'll try adding some lemon zest and a little more lemon juice. 

Delicious Delights: Amish Bread

Delicious Delights is a pretty obvious section. :) This section is about things I make (or friends make) to eat! These will be things that look fabulous as well as taste fabulous...we hope. Hopefully you can learn from any mistakes I make.

This time it is Amish Bread! I've been on a bread craze lately, and I just bought ingredients for a Blueberry Lemon Yogurt Loaf (Pinterest find!), so I'll let you know how that goes.

Amish Bread is a recipe that is fermented yeast. I know, it sounds absolutely disgusting, but it is so good -- it has a lot of sugar in it. Just as a side note, this is not a gluten-free, heart-healthy, anything-healthy food section; its just a yummy section. :) You let the recipe sit on your counter in a gallon Zip-lock bag for 10 days, following the directions for each day, and on day 10 you bake it! It smells weird, and like its rotten, but no worries, its fine. Technically its called Amish Friendship Bread, but that name is too long for me. Its called that because on day 10, you make 4 new Zip-lock bags of Amish Bread. Then it is day 1 again. You give these bags, along with a recipe to your friends and then they can make it...problem is, how do you start it? Well, I found a start recipe that I like, and that worked for me (there are a ton out there) I found the recipe here: http://www.friendshipbreadkitchen.com/pantry/amish-friendship-bread-starter but I altered it a little bit for convenience.

Amish Bread Start:
1/4 C hot water
3 1/4 tsp yeast
1 C flour
1 C sugar
1 C milk

Dissolve yeast into water. Whisk flour and sugar together in a bowl. Slowly mix in milk and yeast mixture into flour and sugar mixture. Pour into gallon sized Zip-Lock bag, seal, and write the date on the outside. This is your Day 1

Daily Instructions (this is the part you give your friends when you give a start to them):
Day 1: Do nothing
Days 2-5: Mush the bag (just squish it around enough to feel like you've mixed it)
Day 6: Add 1 C flour, 1 C sugar and 1 C milk, mush REALLY well, otherwise you get clumps of flour left in your bag
Days 7-9: Mush
Day 10: Oven at 325. Pour contents of bag into a large mixing bowl. Add 1 1/2 C flour, 1 1/2 C sugar, 1 1/2 C milk and stir. Then, with a 1 C measuring cup and 4 new Zip-Locks, measure 1 cup of the mixture into each bag, seal and date (or stick in the freezer for later use. The day you take it out of the freezer is Day 1). Then (don't forget this part! I forgot it the first time...and this is basically everything. It turned out awful...of course) add:
3 eggs
1 C oil
1/2 C milk
1 C sugar
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp soda
1/2 tsp salt
2 C flour

Grease 2, 9" loaf pans and then dust entire pan with sugar. Pour batter evenly into each pan, dust top of batter with sugar (I told you it had lots of sugar in it). Bake at 325 for 1 hour. Believe me, its well worth the wait.

Here are some pictures of my delicious Amish Bread!

I was so excited that it was done, I couldn't wait to take the picture until I had dumped it out, so I took it right then! The tops are my favorite after they're done, soft and sugary...mmmmm 

Let me know how it turns out for you! Happy baking!