Red Velvet Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting

Please welcome Simply Recipes guest contributor Garrett McCord. ~Elise

Red velvet cake is classic Americana cooking with its roots in the south. Deliciously festive, rich, flavorful, red velvet is like yellow cake but with a little kiss on the cheek of chocolate.

The red color can come from beets or even strawberries but personally I unapologetically prefer red food dye and in large quantities as it does a better job of disguising the brown chocolate without altering the flavor.

Be sure to be careful when putting this recipe together as the batter can stain, so you may not want kids putting it together (better to put them on frosting duty).

Adapted into little red cupcakes and topped with a dollop of cream cheese frosting, they make for a colorful and tasty dessert for late winter picnics and are especially sweet for Valentine’s Day or for the Fourth of July if adorned with some blueberries.

Red Velvet Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting Recipe

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups of sugar
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) of butter, room temperature
• 2 eggs, room temperature
• 2 1/3 cups of cake flour
• 2 tablespoons of Dutch-processed cocoa powder
• 1 teaspoon of baking soda
• 1 teaspoon of baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon of salt
• 1 cup of buttermilk*
• 1 1/2 tablespoons of red food coloring
• 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon of distilled white vinegar

Frosting ingredients

• 1/2 cup of butter (1 stick), room temperature
• 8 oz of Philly cream cheese (1 package), room temperature
• 2 - 3 cups of powdered sugar
• 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract

*You can make your own buttermilk by adding a tablespoon of distilled white vinegar to milk and letting it stand for about 10 minutes.

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