My Cupcakes Bring All the Boys to the Yard

Remember when I said I was going to make more ginger cookies for Marcus’s party? Well, I changed my mind. Apparently, they are “too gingery” for some people, so I made vanilla cupcakes with orange buttercream frosting instead.

Cupcakes are everywhere, which is good because they serve a very important purpose for people, like me, who love cake. They make it possible for one to get one’s cake fix without consuming an entire cake. If you put a cake in front of me, I will eat an absurd amount of cake; if you put a cupcake in front of me, I will eat a cupcake (unless you let it slip where the other cupcakes are; then it’s all over). In the quest to maintain my girlish figure, I find cupcakes to be indispensable.

I used Cook’s Illustrated’s recipes for Yellow Cupcakes and Easy Orange Buttercream. This was my first time using these two recipes in particular, but I’ve made Cook’s Illustrated’s Dark Chocolate Cupcakes and Easy Vanilla Bean Buttercream several times with great results. The folks at CI really know what they’re doing, and it’s awesome to have a recipe resource you can actually trust to provide well-developed, delicious recipes. With very few exceptions (and those few owing, most likely, to error on my part), the Cook’s Illustrated recipes I’ve made have produced stellar baked goods.

The finished cupcakes are delicious. I piped the frosting instead of mounding it on with a spatula; I like the more polished look. I happen to think most cupcakes need an extra something on top--for my vanilla/orange ‘cakes I wedged one half of an orange wafer cookie in the frosting on each. I chose these cookies not only because they look pretty, but because they enhance the orangey-ness of the whole cupcake.

One note: I doubled both the recipes, hoping for two dozen finished cupcakes, but the doubled buttercream only yielded enough to frost 13 cupcakes. I was fairly conservative with my piping, too, as I don’t like to have to bite through inches of think frosting before getting to the cake. When I make the Easy Orange Buttercream again--and I probably will because it’s really tasty--I will remember to make more. I have nearly a dozen sad little unfrosted cupcakes sitting in my kitchen right now...luckily I also happen to have a jar of Nutella, which I think will make a superb frosting substitute!