Earth Day Cupcakes

If you have gone on Pinterest at all in the the last month you have probably seen pictures of Earth Day Cupcakes. They look pretty impressive and are much less complicated than they seem.  In the original recipe  the cupcakes have the top cut off, a small heart cookie cutter is used to remove the middle of the cupcake, red frosting fills in the hole, and the top is put back on.  I don't have a small heart cookie cutter so I improvised and piped red buttercream frosting hearts on top of my cupcakes instead.

Earth Day Cupcakes

Here is the recipe.

For the cake:

• 1 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 2 eggs
• 2 tsp. vanilla
• 1 1/2 cups cake flour
• 1 3/4 tsp. baking powder
• 1/2 cup milk
• green and blue food coloring

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.  Line or thoroughly grease a muffin pan.
2. Cream together the sugar and butter.  Beat in the eggs, one at a time, then stir in the vanilla.  Combine flour and baking powder, add to the creamed mixture, and mix well.  Stir in the milk until smooth.  
3. Separate batter into 2 equal parts.  Add green food coloring to one bowl and blue food coloring to the other.  Stir.
4. Alternating colors, drop spoonfuls of green and blue batter into muffin pan.
5. Bake 20-25 minutes, or until a toothpick can be removed cleanly.
6. Let cool thoroughly.

For the buttercream:

• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 1 1/2 - 2 cups powdered sugar
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• red food coloring

1. Cream butter and sugar. 
2. Add vanilla and food coloring.  Mix well. Add more powdered sugar if runny.
3. Fill a piping bag with the buttercream.  Pipe onto cooled cupcakes.

Recipe makes 12 cupcakes.

I love Earth Day!

These cupcakes turned out much better then I thought they would.  They are fluffy, sugary, and buttery all at the same time. Overall a very successful first recipe.

Happy Earth Day!

“Do we really have to destroy tomorrow in order to live today?”
- Gaylord Nelson