Gimme red

Red velvet cupcakes, plain without trimmings, but regal regardless

I've always been in awe of red velvet cupcakes, mostly cuz the name sounds so fancy and royal. I mean, red and velvet, separately conjure up some wow images in your head, put them together and add cupcake to it and you've got heaven on a plate :)
The real tempter was when I had my first red velvet cupcake at Candies in Mumbai with my bro. Ever since, I've been wanting to make this sinful beauty. Tried it after months of eating it and waited with bated breath after making the cupcakes and making my own buttermilk, mind you :)
But as luck would have it, boom, the powers that be put a spanner in the wheels of my plan by shutting down the power supply in my area the minute I put these beauties in the oven. Thankfully, I had a second batch to rely on and the residual heat in the oven carried forward the baking process considerably enough to make the first batch bake well too. If you ever get stuck in a similar situation, I've found that mixing a teeensy amount of baking soda in the batter and mixing it again before baking (when the power comes back on) helps them rise beautifully. The result, was stunning but I decided to go all the way and decorate it with blue and white cream cheese frosting. Indulgent, aint I? :p 
I mixed up a few recipes I found online with some steps of my own.. So without any further ado, here's how you can go about making these red beauties. 


Ingredients:
1 cup flour (maida)

2 tablespoons dark cocoa powder
1/2 cup castor sugar
2 eggs
3/4 cup buttermilk
60 to 80 grams unsalted butter
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon white vinegar
Red food colouring
Salt to taste


For the cream cheese frosting, you will need:
180 grams cream cheese that is at room temperature
200 grams icing sugar
100 grams unsalted butter
1 teaspoon vanilla extract


Making buttermilk:
If you can't find plain buttermilk in the stores (I found only the masala variety everywhere I went), you can make your own buttermilk. Simply add half a teaspoon of lemon juice to 3/4th cup of milk, mix well and leave to rest for about 15 minutes before using.


Making the cupcakes:

• Preheat oven to 180 C
• Beat the butter till fluffy (1 minute) and beat in the sugar as well, till fluffy (2 mins)
• Add the eggs, beating after each addition and beat in the vanilla essence and red food colouring too. You can add as much as you like to get the desired hue. 
• Sift the flour, baking powder, cocoa powder and salt and alternatively add the flour and buttermilk mixture to the batter, starting and ending with the dry  mixture. 
• Just before you pour the batter into the cupcake liners, mix the vinegar and baking soda together and add that fizzy mixture to the batter and mix it in. (This helps make the red look brighter, some say)
• Pour into your liners (1/2 to 2/4th full) and bake for about 35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out dry. 
• Cool the cupcakes before decorating them.

Go wild with colour combos and patterns. Experimentation is the key...

Making the cream cheese frosting:

• Beat the cream cheese and butter till smooth.
• Add in  the vanilla essence and then, the icing sugar bit by bit, beating till it is well incorporated. You can add more or less depending on the consistency you want.
• Divide the mixture onto two halves and colour accordingly. 

Ending on a pretty note

When vanilla beats chocolate

Vanilla queen

One might think a vanilla cake is plain and boring, but I've got news for you - it can blow you away. I chanced upon this recipe from my go-to blogger as always - Ria and modified it a bit and came up with my new favourite cake (yes, chocolate has bowed down to the humble vanilla this time). I love the lil vanilla bean specs in this white cake and white and chocolate ganache seal the deal to make this a cake you will not put down easily. I made it first for an order )sugar-free that too) and have made it twice thereafter in quick succession, thanks to popular demand :) So here's the angelic cake that will bring out the devil in you :p

The sugar-free order clicked by B'day boy Manu Srivastava

Ingredients:

• 2 cups maida
• 113 grams unsalted butter (1/2 cup) at room temperature
• 1 cup castor sugar (substitute with a sugar-free baking sugar or sugar substitute for sugar-free cakes for diabetic people) 
• 1 cup milk
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1 teaspoon vanilla essence
• 1 vanilla pod
• 2 eggs
• A pinch of salt

For the dark chocolate ganache, head to my previous post or click here - ganache. For white chocolate ganache, simple replace dark chocolate with white chocolate.

Method:

• Pre-heat your oven to 180C 
• Sift the flour and baking soda so that there are no lumps formed and keep it aside.
• Slit your vanilla bean lengthwise and scrape out the seeds from both halves and keep aside. You can use the bean ‘shells’ to make yum vanilla sugar. Simply place them in your sugar container and there you have it.
• In a large mixing bowl, whip up your butter and sugar with an electric mixer till smooth and fluffy.
• Add your eggs one by one and beat after each addition.
• Add in the vanilla seed mixture and beat till incorporated and you can see lovely specs of black vanilla bean seeds in the batter.
• Add in the flour and milk alternatively, beating continuously, starting and ending with flour. Make sure to beat it till the batter is light and fluffy. Do not use all the milk if the batter is too runny.
• Pour into a prepared baking mould (butter the inside or use cooking spray) or pour into cupcake moulds lined with cupcake liners.
• Bake for 30 mins or so till a toothpick inserted comes out dry.

Decorating your cake/cupcakes:

For the cupcakes, just dip them top side up into melted ganache and leave to rest.

Sugar-free cupcakes dipped in melted chocolate ganache

You can also just alternate slivers of dark and white chocolate ganache, using a spoon to let the ganache flow into ribbons.

Cupcakes drizzled with slivers of white and dark chocolate ganache

Halve the cake, fill with chocolate ganache and top up with the same, adding globs of white chocolate on the edges if desired.

Vanilla cake filled and topped with ganache

Happy Birthday Wuffie

Last year, around this time, I was beaming with joy as I had just spent a day with my very own puddytat, Wuffie. An adorable white fluff ball, he stole my heart the minute I set my eyes on him. He has an almost angelic quality about him, what with everyone saying he has angel eyes :) New beginnings were in order not just for me with the new home, marriage and the rest, but for him too with a new home. Ah how I waited to bring him home, carried the tiny fluff ball in my hands and promised to keep him happy. 

     He slept with me and stuck by my side for the first few days. He was my poonch (tail) like Ma would say. Where ever I turned I would find him in the house and he has been a big part of my kitchen (no, he wouldn't cook with me :p ), but would always lie down on a box in the kitchen while I would cook and bake. Just having him around made my day and I would sing and cook with him as company in the kitchen, although he had his 'I hate the kitchen' moments too, thanks to my new hob. He would always be on my shoulders, loving the view from the top :) One day, as I was cooking he came and rubbed his head against my legs, signalling a pick me up command. Off he came on my shoulder. I put the hob on to take away the cooking smells and boom, he scratched me and jumped away in horror, wondering what that monstrous sound was. One day later, however, he was back to his box in the kitchen looking at me pottering away.       

     Apart from baking and cooking, Wuffie (He was white and fluffy, so he got christened Wuffie) has been my pride and joy and to celebrate his birthday (the day we got him home technically) I baked, what else but cupcakes, two mini ones. You can use any recipe for the cupcakes, I used the leftover batter from a marble cake (coming up in another post). I tried a new piping technique (basket weave) I learnt and I must say, I'm mighty pleased with the result (Pic no 1 at the beginning of the post). A tutorial on the extremely simple and great looking piping technique will be coming up shortly. For the second one (the white one) I simply used a star tip and piped dots of it so to say, all over the cupcake.

Wuffie got a dab of icing that he licked off in delight and had a teeny bit of the cake and was one happy cat :) 


Happy Birthday my fur ball.
   

Wuffie, the week we got him home