Made from scratch!

YAY!! I successfully created home-made cupcakes and frosting for the first time!! Now, when I say "successfully" I mean that I made some form of edible cupcakes and some form of edible frosting without a store bought mixture. I wish that by saying "successfully" I would mean that they were the most delicious things I've ever tasted, but sadly, I cannot. Don't get me wrong, they weren't the worst things I've ever tasted nor were they burnt or anything but they just weren't amazing like I hoped they would be. I had high hopes for my first time.... ;)

I also can't say that I mixed all of the ingredients without using a recipe. I don't think they would have turned out as okay as they did if I hadn't used one. I'm most certainly not at the "eye-ball it" stage. Before now, I didn't have a clue as to what even went into a cupcake or frosting mix. So, after some research, I found and used these two sites, Cupcakes and Frosting. Honestly, the only reason I chose them was because in each of those recipes I had all of the ingredients they called for. Some wanted canola oil, crisco, merengue powder (whatever the heck that is) or some other odd item that I would never in a lifetime have in my cabinet. Those recipes were simple and that's exactly what I needed for my first 'from scratch' baking experience.

So, though the cupcakes and frosting were okaaaay, (they passed the boyfriend test...although men will probably eat anything, right?), they were far from delicious. The cupcakes were dense and a little over baked, not to mention poured unevenly into the liners. I think my very old oven, hopefully my apartment gets an upgrade with the upcoming "renovations" they keep talking about, is hotter and bakes more unevenly than most because I put the cupcakes in for a minute less than what was recommended and a few came out more brown than the others. The cupcakes were also not as sweet as I would have liked...more sugar, please!! On the other hand, the frosting was TOO sweet and also runny. I put in all the right portions [plus about 5 more cups of powdered sugar to thicken up my frosting- bad idea?] and followed the recipes exactly and they still weren't that great.

Here are a few pics from my baking adventure-

First came the mixing (oohhhh, aahhhhh):

Taste test--Butter and sugar together is SO yummy! But, of course, I didn't taste the batter in the pic below with the raw egg (ewwwwww). 

Then came the finished product (yep, that quickly and without any mess, of course :-P):

See how uneven they are in both color and height?

See how runny it is?

One of these days, when I'm not a beginner anymore, I will try and post some baking How-To's. I know there are TONS of blogs out there (like this amazing one that I'm currently obsessed with: Bake at 350- her cookies are amazing and I will eventually tackle those) that have baking tips and tricks but I want to try it anyway. Right now I'm just trying to learn from my mistakes and trying not to repeat them the next time. Let's see how that goes.

Until later,

Baker in Training