Cupcakes & Frosting

What is it about a child's first few birthday parties that makes parents go crazy?  =) I often see elaborate set ups for friends and families for the first 1-2-3 years of a child's life and I wonder...is this party for the baby or for the parents?

Such was the dilemma of a good friend during this past October.  Unfortunately my friend, Deanna Gin, who does amazing cakes was all booked up for the month!  So what is a friend to do? (Remember...I happen to be a SAVORY cook, not a pastry chef.)

In the interest of time and convenience, my friend E baked the cupcakes in cute color coordinated liners earlier in the day so that we could focus on the most important part of the cake...the FROSTING!!

E chose two flavors - red velvet cake and vanilla, so we decided to make vanilla frosting (with vanilla cake) and cream cheese frosting (with red velvet cake).

If you have never made fresh frosting before, I highly recommend it.  It's fairly straightforward (remember - savory chef here) and the return on your time is IMMENSE.  REAL FROSTING is miles above the garbage you can buy at the store, whereas it is oftentimes difficult to taste the difference between boxed cake mix and homemade.

** NOTE - making your own cakes from scratch DOES allow you to control the quality and types of ingredients used in your finished product, so there is that benefit.

We made vanilla italian buttercream - much maligned as she is, Martha (or rather her staff) has a great Italian buttercream recipe: http://www.marthastewart.com/356465/italian-meringue-buttercream

You just need a good thermometer and a stand mixer to make your own frosting - it's so good, everyone will be fighting to lick the mixing bowl!  The biggest trick is to ensure that your butter is ROOM TEMP (here the recipe is wrong) and you need to add the butter to the meringue only after it has cooled enough so that you whip in the whole butter and it maintains it's emulsion instead of melting and separating.  For more about the different types of buttercreams, please consult the interweb.

FROM Martha Stewart Living, January 2004
Yield - Makes 4 1/2 cups

Ingredients1 1/4 cups sugar, 5 large egg whites, Pinch of cream of tartar, 1 pound (4 sticks) UNSALTED butter, ROOM TEMP!!!, 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract 

Directions
1. In a small saucepan over medium heat, bring sugar and 2/3 cup water to a boil. Continue boiling until syrup reaches 238 degrees on a candy thermometer (soft-ball stage).
2. Meanwhile, place egg whites in the bowl of a standing mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, and beat on low speed until foamy. Add cream of tartar, and beat on medium-high speed until stiff but not dry; do not overbeat.
3. With mixer running, add syrup to whites in a stream, beating on high speed until no longer steaming, about 3 minutes. Add butter bit by bit, beating until spreadable, 3 to 5 minutes; beat in vanilla. If icing curdles, keep beating until smooth.

Here's the recipe for the cream cheese frosting - super simple.  We made double this recipe, cut the sugar in half and added the juice of about half a lemon (to taste).  This makes the frosting less cloying.

Ingredients

• 4 ounces unsalted butter, softened

• 4 ounces cream cheese, softened

• 2 cups powdered sugar

• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions
In a large bowl, beat together the butter and cream cheese with an electric mixer. With the mixer on low speed, add the powdered sugar a cup at a time until smooth and creamy. Beat in the vanilla extract

Once you have the frosting made, you simply put a cup or two into a piping bag (or gallon sized zip lock) with an appropriate sized pastry tip for the desired "look" and then you swirl it on like soft serve ice cream.  =)  Just make sure that you have made enough frosting for all your cupcakes!

"naked" cream cheese frosting on red velvet

decorated vanilla italian buttercream on vanilla cupcake