Hello March!! How is everyone’s body/mind adjusting to the time change?? haha. I worked 12 hour nights over the weekend so ended up working an 11 hour night Saturday, that part was great but my body is still playing catch up, sleeping in too late and drinking too much coffee haha. It’s hard to tell how much of that is from the actual time change versus the Slot Bonus New Member, but I’m sooo ready for longer evenings!!
I thought with St Patricks Day coming soon that I would FINALLY share my favorite butter cream icing recipe with you with a fun frosting technique (it looks scary but I’ll show you how to do it). It’s only got a few ingredients, so if you love to bake it should be a piece of cake 😉 Actually, It’s a really easy recipe and I’ve given it out to several people over the years. It’s my go to recipe and depending on what flavor of cupcake or cake recipe I’m pairing it with, I make slight additions/changes and it always tastes great. I thought it would be fun for St Patricks Day to do a cupcake two ways! One for the kiddos and one for the grownups! So the recipe can be made with just a couple of changes.
First, I’ll share my go to cupcake recipe. I found it on Pinterest a few years ago so I’ll just share the link first https://mykitchenrecipes7.blogspot.com/2019/02/moist-vanilla-cupcakes.html as I can’t take credit for the recipe. It’s a really easy recipe, so easy in fact that my nieces make it all the time with me and it always turns out. I should point out that when I look for a cake/cupcake recipe, I always look for a higher sugar to flour ratio and one that also has baking powder. That way I know Slot Gacor Hari Ini they will be sweet and have a nice “fluff” to them.
I always use a small potato scoop to fill my cupcake liners. I put two scoops of batter into each liner, that way they are all the same size and It makes less mess than trying to pour the batter in. When I make this recipe I get close to 30 cupcakes.
I thought it would be fun to have green batter for the occasion but I forgot to add the food coloring until part way in, so I did half and half. haha Cook the cupcakes as per the recipe linked above. Icing recipe is posted below. Remember not to open the oven while the cupcakes are cooking, they will flatten with the sudden change of temperature. Once they start to pull away at sides, then it’s safe to open the oven door. This goes for any baked dessert that has eggs.
Buttercream Icing
- 1 1/2 cups of butter at room temperature ( most recipes for buttercream icing call for unsalted butter, I’ve always used ADL salted butter and it turns out great) Whipped with hand or stand mixer until really soft. See the photo below. After butter is whipped add:
- 4 1/2 cups of icing sugar
- 1 1/2 tsp. of vanilla
- 3 Tablespoons of cream ( I use 18% coffee creamer from ADL)
- Mix all together with a hand or stand mixer until combined, scraping down the sides of the bowl a few times.
I then separated into 4 bowls, you can make less or more colors depending on how you want your cupcakes to look. I made the frosting quite vibrant but by adding less food coloring, the colors will have a more pastel look which would be really pretty too.
These are the colors I used. I always use a paste food coloring, so it doesn’t add extra liquid to the icing, which will affect It’s consistency.
I had a couple of triangle shaped bags here, but if you don’t, a sandwich bag with one of the corners cut out should work. We aren’t using these bags to ice the cupcakes. To ice the actual cupcakes you should use a reusable piping bag or you can also buy disposable ones. When you squeeze a sandwich bag too hard, I find that the seams rip, making a mess. 😛 So take a “piping” bag (one for each color) and fill each with It’s own color of icing.
Then, using saran wrap, lying out flat on the counter, pipe a line of each color, side by side.
Then, wrap the icing up with the saran wrap. Kind of like a sausage, twisting each end. Then cut off one end at the twist (which will be the end inserted down into the piping bag used to ice the cupcakes). You can kind of see in the photo below, I forgot to take a picture of that part. You’ll have to do this step several times, using a new, clean piece of saran wrap each time.
I used just a plain large tip (1A) but you can use whatever tip you have, or if you just buy a disposable piping bag, you can use it with just the tip cut off. Larger tips work better for frosting cupcakes than small ones.
Hold your piping bag at a 90 degree angle (straight up) from the top of the cupcake. Make 3-4 even swirls (like an ice cream cone would look). It takes a bit of practicing to get them even. Remember that the icing is made of butter, which gets softer the more you handle it. So if your hands are really warm or the icing is handled a lot, it will be really soft and not hold It’s shape well.
This is what the tip will look like, and when you squeeze it out, it looks like a rainbow! 🙂
I initially wanted those gold wrapped chocolate “coins” to put on top but couldn’t find any. I did find some gold sprinkles at the dollar store, yayy!! So I decided to make “pots of gold” instead. I used mini chocolate eggs cut in half with a bit of frosting on top, then covered with gold sprinkles.
The finished product! Looks complicated, but not really.
The adult version!
Haha. So, I used the same recipe for the cupcakes, although chocolate would also be a good choice. The only change I made was in the icing. I only had the salted caramel version of Baileys on hand, which was really sweet. So I think they would have been better with just the plain, regular Baileys. A little bit of whiskey in the cupcake batter might be good also :O, if you feel daring haha.
For the icing for the adult version (recipe is the same as above) but I replaced the cream with Baileys, I also put less than a tsp. of vanilla instead of the 1 1/2. That’s it!
I found some Hershey’s “gold” bars and cut out each square (carefully) they break easy, and used that as the topper.
How fun are these to take to an adult St Patricks Day get together? If you make either version, be sure to tag me on social media. I love seeing ideas that I have come to life, and being able to “teach” someone something new.
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Now, I must go have another cup of coffee…. haha
