Vanilla Cupcakes with Red Current Jelly

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1/2 c. Butter, room temperature
1 c. Sugar
2 Large eggs, room temperature
1-1/3 c. All-purpose flour
1/2 tsp Baking powder
1/2 tsp Baking soda
1/8 tsp Salt
1/2 c. Milk
1 tsp Vanilla
Red current jelly
Frosting
Sprinkles

[Make 10-12 cupcakes]


Preheat the oven to 350°F.

Beat butter until soft (about 30 seconds) using an electric beater.

Add sugar a little bit at a time. Beat until light and fluffy (about 3 minutes).


Add eggs one at a time, beat for 30 seconds between each egg.

Note: Before you add the flour, be sure all ingredients are well mixed. Use a spatula to scrap off the remaining ingredients and mix well. Once the flour is added, beat long enough to blend the flour into the mixture and do not over-mix.

Mix together flour, baking powder, and baking soda in a bowl.

Measure out milk and vanilla. Combine together.

Add about a 1/4 of the dry ingredients (flour) to the wet (butter/sugar) mixture and beat to combine.

Add about 1/3 of the the milk/vanilla mixture and beat until combined.

Continue to add the remaining ingredients, alternating flour and milk, and ending with the flour mixture.

Scoop into cupcake papers about 2/3 full.

Bake for 17 minutes until the toothpick comes out clean.

Let the cupcakes cool on rack before proceeding to the next steps.


Fill the center of the cupcakes with your favourite filling using the Cone Method.


Decorate the top with frostings and sprinkles.


My comments:

For once in my life, I followed a recipe without improvising and these cupcakes turned out fantastic!! They were light, fluffy and not sweet at all! I got the Vanilla Cupcakes recipe (Magnolia Bakery Cookbook) from Cupcake Bakeshop which is a totally fab cupcake blog. There, you'll find tons of different cupcake recipes and a lot of tips on baking the perfect cupcakes which I found to be very very useful.

The original recipe said to bake the cupcakes for 20-22 min and check them 2 minutes before they are supposed to be ready. I checked my cupcakes at 17 min and they were perfect. I decided to spice up the cupcakes by adding some fillings which is something I have never done before. I used the cone method described in Cupcake Bakeshop and it was very easy to do. Since this is my first time making cupcakes with a "real" recipe, I wanted to keep things simple and use already-made filling. I chose the Red Current Jelly, homemade by my mother-in-law, because it's super delicious. The jelly went extremely well with the cupcake and I was very happy with the results.

I also decided against making my own icing. Everyone tells me it's easy to do but once again, I wanted to keep this simple. So I bought the Betty Crocker Whipped Vanilla Frosting and I added in a little sprinkles of my own. I don't have a fancy icing-squirting thing but I read somewheres a long time ago that I can just use a good ol' sandwich bag for decorating with frosting. I figured this was going to turn into a sweet and delicious nightmare but I tried it anyway! The whole frosting experiment turned out surprisingly well! The sandwich bag method was easy to do and the icing came out really smooth. The colour on the sprinkles bled a bit in the icing but it left a ribbon effect on the swirl of frosting which was very pretty!!

My only complaint these cupcakes is that I went a little overboard with the frosting and I thought the overall product was too sweet. However, making my own frosting is definitely on my To-Learn list, so hopefully I'll be able to perfect the frosting and make these cupcakes even more delicious! I have no plans on making my own fillings just yet because I thought my mother-in-law's red current jelly was great and there's no reason to change something that's already wonderful!

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