De-stressing feast part 1: Red Velvet Cupcake

Sometimes I love to cook to de-stress but it gets boring when you have to eat it all by yourself. When you've been in Uni almost quarter of your life just studying like you don't have a life, sometimes just sometimes you need a time-out.

I call it a feast for the fact that we (I and 12 of my pals, yes TWELVE) didn't just have Baked Red Velvet Cupcakes, there was a main meal with some of my favourite ingredients which I had stated in one of my previous posts.
The cupcakes were part of the dessert which went well with one of the best drinks I've ever had. I won't ruin the surprise cause I'd be giving you the recipe for the other two in part 2 & 3 of De-stressing feast.

This recipe was supposed to be donuts but I didn't have a donut pan so I used a muffin pan and it's more of a cake than donut so I decided to call it cake. I also tweaked mine a bit. First I doubled the recipe which yielded about a dozen and a half (should have yielded 24 but cakes were bigger than they were supposed to be). Second, the eggs I used were small (instead of large) so I doubled it (so I used 4 eggs) and lastly I added a little extra flour (about ½ a cup more). They still turned out good, soft and velvety.

A few notes about the recipe – the dough is pretty stiff. I had to get in and use my hands to fill the donut pan with the dough.

Baked Red Velvet Donuts

Prep Time: 15 minutes                                   Yield: 1 dozen donuts

Cook Time: 15 minutes

Total Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

Donuts

2 ¼ cups flour

1 tablespoon baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

½ teaspoon salt

¾ cup sugar

1 large egg

2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted

2 ounces unsweetened chocolate, melted

1/2 tablespoon vanilla extract

½ cup buttermilk

1 tablespoon red food colouring

Chocolate topping

Your favourite chocolate

Or you can use icing

Icing

2 tablespoons hot water

2 cups confectioners sugar (no need to buy if you don't have, just blend/mill ordinary sugar till it's powdery)

1 tablespoon milk

½ teaspoon vanilla extract

Instructions:

*To melt chocolate, Make sure the chocolate is chopped into uniform pieces to ensure even melting. Avoid all contact with water! Chocolate will seize and become unworkable if it comes into contact with even a few droplets of water. Make sure your bowls, workstation, and spatulas are completely dry. Put chocolate in a microwave-safe bowl It is very difficult to determine exact microwaving times, as it can vary depending on microwave wattage, quantity of chocolate, and even the cocoa butter content of the chocolate. So I'd advise you run the microwave in 30 second increments, stirring in between and rotating the bowl if necessary. Finish heating when most, but not all, of the chocolate is melted. Stir the chocolate continuously until it is smooth, shiny, and completely melted.  

Donuts

Preheat the oven to 175˚C (350˚F). Oil donut pan lightly or spray a  with cooking spray.

In a large bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.

In another bowl, mix together the sugar and egg. Add the melted butter and melted chocolate* to the egg/sugar mixture. Add in the vanilla and buttermilk and red food colouring.

Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture, mixing just until combined. Fill the donut pan with the batter, filling each about 2/3 full. Bake in the preheated oven for 12-15 minutes.

Topping

Pour melted chocolate* over cake.

Icing

In a medium glass or microwave-safe bowl, heat the butter and cream cheese until melted. Whisk together until smooth, then whisk in powdered sugar and vanilla. Set aside. In small bowl, stir together all ingredients except butter-cheese mixture until sugar is completely dissolved. Mix everything. Use immediately to glaze donuts. You can either toss them in or dip just the tops. If the glaze starts to harden you can add more hot water.

It was a good night, everybody left happy and were fine the following day :D, YAY! A few days later I made the cake again for one of my pals who missed out, this time with more chocolate less colouring. It was that good. Enjoy! Comments welcome.

Source: Adapted from Taste and Tell