Rose Cupcakes

 

One year ago today, I was going mental baking up a cake and cupcakes galore! I had the honor of baking one of my best friend's wedding cakes and while it was awesome, turns out I never want to do that again. I had stressed so much about getting it perfect that I had a stomachache for days. We finally arrived at the restaurant where the reception was held and my stomach was miraculously cured.

 

I promised my friends that on their one-year anniversary, I would make them a mini cake so they could celebrate by eating a good cake and not one that has been shoved in the back of the freezer for a year. 

 

I mixed up the batter and realized that I had tons of batter left over - cupcakes were in my future! As I was being all nostalgic, I did the cupcakes up the same way as I had done for the wedding - vanilla bean cake, lemon curd and vanilla Swiss meringue buttercream (the superior buttercream). 

 

I started with a vanilla bean cake recipe from Sweetapolita, because her recipes are always delicious. The cake batter is creamy and wonderful and has tiny vanilla bean specks throughout. So beautiful!!!

 

 

It bakes up flawlessly - I have never had an issue with the cupcakes overflowing. I HATE when that happens. The next step was to core the cuppies. Last year when I was doing these, I cored these bad boys with a spoon. It was fine, but this year thanks to a wonderful friend, I have a cupcake corer! Wowza did this make a big difference. I don't know how many times in your life you need to core a cupcake, but if it's more than once I would kind of recommend getting this. The cores come out so nice and even, and the cupcakes look so pretty.

 

 

That being said, this whole coring situation is jumping ahead a bit. While the cake is baking, I made the lemon curd - I love me some lemon curd!

 

 

I could eat lemon curd by the spoonful, and would by lying if I said I didn't sneak a spoonful or two before filling the cores.

 

 

Again, that whole filling bit is jumping ahead since the curd has to chill for a few hours. While it was chilling I made the Swiss meringue buttercream. I cooked the egg whites and sugar to 150F, even though the recipe says to 140F. That being said, I just looked online and saw that according to the Egg Safety Center, you should cook eggs to 160F. Whoops! I'm sure it's fine - my husband eats raw eggs on rice all the time and he's still alive.

 

 

Once the buttercream is finished, you are ready to assemble - core, fill and pipe.

 



 

Then eat!!