Red Velvet B52 Cupcakes

I got super lazy and did not decorate them really, a few blue sprinkles and I was done.  I may have taste tested a little too much boozy frosting.  So you are just lucky I got a picture.  And it is even sort of in focus.  Double win!

  I love thinking up things that I think no one has thought up before. I also like to not google my idea, because more often then naught it's been done before.  I am sure these have been done, in some form, but there is no way I am going to look.  I want to just imagine I am the first ever to do this.  So you know, at least I don't crawl into a hole and cry that I have nothing to call my own in the baking world.

  So these came about when I was walking by the liquor store and thought, I have not been in one in ages.  The last time just before the holidays I had no clue where to even find stuff.  So I went in and looked at all the stuff.  I had wanted to get some Bailey's but the different flavors only came in huge bottles, so I went to the cash and checked out the stuff there.  I found these tiny bottles, about $8 each and thought they would  be good.  I then remembered that a B52 was something I had always liked the sound of, never had one actually, so no idea why I thought of it.  Anyway I googled it and found that I needed amaretto or something, anyway it was an almond flavor so I figured that I could use almond extract.  

This is what I used, and I wasted almost 3/4 of a cup of the stuff when I ruined my first batch of icing.  If I was a drinker I might have cried.  As it was I swore a bit at the waste of money.

  Now I made these with a Red Velvet cupcake, since Pork Chop had been asking me to make him cupcakes for a few days. And he made it very clear he wanted red velvet.  No idea, he is weird.  Usually he is all " I want cupcakes!" So we make them and he decorates them with a million sprinkles, and I even scrape the icing off for him at his request, then he doesn't eat them.  So I was a little leery of making them.

  But I said I would and I did, I made him 4, 1 with frosting and 3 without.  He ended up eating 3 and only leaving one icing free cupcake.  Which is amazing for him.  And I just did plain frosting for him, he is crazy enough without booze, and it might be illegal or something too.


  So to make these I used the same cupcake recipe that I used to make wedding cupcakes.  I did not post the recipe on that post, but here I will. And since this post is going up before the wedding one, it totally works out.  It is an oil based recipe which was weird to me, but everyone who has had them has said they are super moist and really good.  I agree, so this is going to be one of my make again and again things.

This is the oil and sugar, I was really worried at how it would turn out, I had my doubts.

   So I had pinned this recipe on My Baking Addiction a while back.  I had never made red velvet from scratch up to this point.  So maybe they all use oil as a base, I don't know really.  That would require research and I just don't want to do it.  So whatever, this is a great and easy recipe.

Red Velvet Cupcakes
From My Baking Addiction

makes 24 large

Pre heat oven to 350

-2 cups cake flour
-4 TBPS cocoa powder
-1 TSP salt
-1 1/3 cups vegetable oil
-1 1/2 cups sugar
-2 eggs
-2 TSP vanilla bean paste or regular vanilla
-red food coloring as needed*
-1 cup butter milk **
-1 TSP baking soda
-1 1/2 TSP white vinegar

*I used gel paste and just put in enough to get the colour I wanted, I think it was about 1 TSP, but just put in a little at a time to see how much you need

** I make my own by putting about 1 TBSP of white vinegar in a measuring cup then filling it up to the 1 cup line with the milk, then stir and let sit for about 5 minutes


  My Baking Addiction suggested using the wire whisk attachment on your mixer, I tried it with that and the paddle, I think it was just as easy with the paddle.

  Mix the sugar and oil until combined, then mix in the egg.  Slowly add your vanilla then the food colouring until it is a nice dark red.  Have all your dry ingredients sifted together ( except the baking soda) and add half of it, then the buttermilk, then the other half of the dry ingredients.  Mix until just blended.  Then add the vinegar to the baking soda, stir it until the soda dissolves then add it and mix into the batter.  Then fill baking cups and bake for about 15 minutes. Or until a tooth pick inserted into the middle comes out clean.

This is after the food gel was added, it got even darker when I added the dry ingredients due to the cocoa powder.

  I found the batter to be really thin, so I did not use my ice cream scoop as I usually would.  I filled the largest squeeze bottle I had and that worked great.  I managed to spill a bunch of it, as I thought using a measuring cup would be smart.  I probably was smart, I am just not smart enough to do it properly.

This was my super smart idea to fill the bottle and not spill.  I did not take a picture of the table with the huge puddles of batter, that would have given you the idea I am not so smart.

  They bake up nice and fluffy and they are not a dense cupcake like some other recipes I had done, which is fine.  I love a nice dense cupcake, but these were fluffy like a box mix, but moist not dry.  I cannot see this working well for a frosted cake as it would not be very sturdy.  But as a cupcake, it is perfect!

I also took a top view so you would not see the Halloween cupcake liners I used.  They were on sale so I have like 5 million of them.

 So once they were cooled I got to work on my icing.  And I will tell you right now, I had to toss out about 8 cups of icing, all because I am lazy and ruined the first batch.  If you know me you know I usually don't measure, and this can lead to you screwing up.  Usually it is not an issue, if you add too much milk, just add some more sugar to thicken it up.  Too much vanilla, same thing, add more milk and sugar.  But when you are using something very strong like almond extract, which is very alcohol y tasting you have to be careful, which obviously I was not.  So take it from me, if you add to much, just stop and start again.  I kept adding more sugar and booze trying to make it better, it did not work.  Pork Chop nearly lost his mind when he saw me tossing out all the icing.  He was all "What are you doing!" And I was all, the icing went bad, I have to make it again.

  He must never know I am not perfect!

  So this is an easy recipe, you can use more or less booze, you can even use amaretto or whatever it is in a real B52, I was just cheap and this is what I did.  As they were for my co workers and I did not want them to be drunk as they were working.  Although that would have really made for a fun day for me, I used half milk and half booze.

 B52 Frosting
Adapted from me just tossing stuff in a bowl and mixing it and it will cover about 24 cupcakes

-1 cup butter
-2 TBSP vanilla bean paste, or vanilla
-milk as needed
- 1 1/2 TSP almond extract or amaretto as needed
-Irish cream as needed
-Kahlua as needed
-icing sugar as needed
-2 TBSPs cocoa powder

Cream the butter and vanilla until well blended.  If using almond extract blend that in as well. Add the cocoa powder.  Mix together your booze, I did about 1/4 cup of each.  Add the booze to the butter and blend, it will be sort of lumpy.  Add icing sugar and then alternate between icing sugar and milk to get it as thick as you like and as much as you need.  If you want more booze, cut down on the milk and obviously if you want less, use more milk.  You can also get all of the flavorings for this in most baking supply stores.  And be warned that if you only use booze it is strong, but I like that as I don't drink.  What is better than getting drunk off a cupcake? Nothing, that's what!

And again, the post frosting picture.

  So I made 12 for work and they were gone so fast, which is great, because some times things don't go so fast and I think people hate them.  I probably work with a bunch of closet drunks and they don't even realize it.  That's okay as long as they like them.

 And since Pork Chop liked the ones without boozy icing you know I will make these again. And when he is of age, look out!  Boozy cupcakes every day!