Red Velvet Cupcake for Valentine : Free And Easy Bake-Along #18

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY !!!

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY EVERYONE!!   To celebrate Valentine's Day, together with Lena and Zoe, we made Red Velvet Cupcakes for our Bake-Along. What did you make for Valentine's Day?

Instead of using the usual cream cheese frosting that usually goes with red velvet cakes, for these cupcakes I use a simple icing made up of just icing sugar and lemon juice, really nice actually and pairs wonderfully with these cupcakes.

Decorating cakes certainly is not one of my best skills! I did thought of doing a decoration using fondant as I have never done anything with fondant before, but on second thought, best leave the "fondant experiment" when I'm ready for it! 

I only made half the recipe and instead of getting 12 cupcakes, I only got 8. The only changes I did was, for half a recipe, I used only 1/2 cup of sugar and 3/4 tablespoon of red food colour.  And instead of using buttermilk, I use the mixture of homemade yoghurt and some milk, which always works well for me.

This Red Velvet Cupcakes is very good! The texture of the cupcakes is really moist, soft and tender! Yum!

Let's go over to Lena from Frozen Wings and Zoe from Bake For Happy Kids, to see their beautiful Red Velvet Cupcakes, and also to our friends who are baking along with us in the linky below. 

We have one exciting news to share regarding our Bake-Along!  

Starting from our next Bake-Along on 28th Feb, we will be  changing our linky to a blog hop. You may copy the blog-hop codes when baking along with us, go to the link provided, which you can find from  the hosts' (myself, Lena and Zoe) bake-along post, copy the code and paste it at the bottom of your post in the HTML page of your blog post and submit your link as usual. All the links will then be published at the bottom of your very own post! This blog-hop will stay open for 7 days. Please remember to mention this Bake-Along blog-hop event in your own post linking direct to any of the hosts' post and leave a comment.  If you have any queries, please email us and we will be glad to assist you!

Starting from 28/02

To summarise, here's what you got to do :

1. go to the blog-hop link provided.

2. copy the codes

3. paste the codes in your HTML page of your drafted post

4. post as usual and submit your post via the link.


Please remember to :
5. mention Bake-Along event in your own post linking direct to any of the hosts' post

6. leave a comment at any of the hosts' post.

7. visit at least one or two other links and leave a comment, everyone loves that!

For our next Bake-Along, we will be baking Lemon Poppy Seed-Sour Cream Cake, from Rose's Heavenly Cakes, or you may get the recipe here. We will be posting this bake on 28/02, remember this will be a blog hop! Hope you can join us, everyone's welcome! See you!

Red Velvet Cupcakes
(adapted from "The Big Book of Cupcakes" by Betty Crocker)
Makes : 24 regular cupcakes
2-1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 cup unsweetened baking cocoa
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup butter or margarine, softened
1-1/2 cups granulated sugar 
2 eggs
1 bottle (1oz) red food colour (about 2 tablespoons)
1-1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup buttermilk
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 tablespoon white vinegar

1. Heat oven to 350F. Place paper baking cup in each of 24 regular-size muffin cups. In small bowl, mix flour, cocoa and salt, set aside.
2. In large bowl, beat 1/2 cup butter and the granulated sugar with electric mixer on medium speed until mixed. Add eggs; beat 1 to 2 minutes or until light and fluffy. Stir in food colour and vanilla. On low speed, alternately add flour mixture, 1/3 at a time, and buttermilk, 1/2 at a time, beating just until blended. Beat in baking soda and vinegar until well blended.
3. Divide batter evenly among muffin cups, filling each about 2/3 full.
4. Bake 20 to 22 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Remove from pans to cooling racks to cool.