red velvet cupcake

I have heard about "red velvet cake" for some time.  The lovely looking cake has always intrigued me although I have not gotten around to baking it.

The Chickadees' childcare centre is closed today for the school move. Baby Chickadee has gone to her ex-babysitter's home for the day. In fact, my niece will be joining Baby Chickadee at the sitter's home, at least for several hours. What fun the two little munchkins will have today!

As for Princess Chickdee, her classmate's mother has very kindly offered to let Princess Chickadee hang out at her home today for a playdate with Princess Chickadee's classmate.

This is the first time that Princess Chickadee has gone on a playdate without me. Would she shed tears when I leave for work? Well, as it turned out, she was so happy to arrive at her buddy's home that she promptly forgot about me. Instead, it was I who kept lingering on at the doorway, trying to say "bye" yet another time to my beloved girl.

It is customary in our culture that when you go to another person's home, you do not turn up empty-handed. However, I worked late yesterday and as such, I did not have time to buy anything for Princess Chickadee to bring to her friend's home. As such, after I got home from work, I decided to bake some cupcakes. Princess Chickadee just had a playdate with some of her schoolmates at Gardens By The Bay on 13 May 2014 and as such, I did not want to bake butter cupcakes again. At this juncture, red velvet cupcakes came to mind. It was time to give this a try!

The verdict? I am pleased with this first attempt at red velvet cupcakes. As you can see from the photograph above, the cupcake turned out lovely.

This is an easy recipe, so do give it a try!

INGREDIENTS

2 1/2 cups cake flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
2 tbsp cocoa powder
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup buttermilk (or 1 cup milk + 1 tbsp lemon juice)
2 tbsp liquid red colouring
125g butter (softened)
1 1/2 cups castor sugar
1 tsp apple cider vinegar
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda

METHOD

1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees celsius.

2. Line the cupcake pans with paper cases.  Set aside.

3. Sift the cake flour, baking powder, salt and cocoa powder in a bowl.  Set aside.

4. Mix the eggs, vanilla extract, buttermilk and liquid red colouring in a bowl.  Set aside.

5. Cream the butter with the sugar in a mixing bowl until light and fluffy.

6. Add the dry ingredients alternately with the wet ingredients into the butter/sugar mixture, mixing well with each addition.

7. Mix the vinegar with bicarbonate of soda in a small bowl before quickly mixing it into the cake mixture.

8. Scoop into the prepared cupcake pans.

9. Bake for 15 to 20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle of the cupcake comes out clean.