Red Velvet Cupcakes (with Cream Cheese Frosting)

They say you should never eyeball things for baking, but…I’ve kinda been doing that because it lessens the time I need to spend washing everything. It’s been turning out okay? (Still no complaints. :X )

I got this from skinnytaste and made a bunch of modifications because I didn’t have buttermilk, unsweetened cocoa or cake flour and as somewhat of a rule of thumb, I generally end up halving the amount of sugar that recipes call for out of habit because I don’t like it when things are too sweet. (No one’s ever complained yet.) Since we spend so much time sitting around and studying, I figure diet is one of the few things we can all still at least somewhat control (I still make it to the gym pretty regularly, save for subtracting a day or two during test weeks), so that might as well be the factor that I tweak (diet is [at least] 70% of the results you see in the mirror anyway). I tried to make em’ as healthy as possible while still getting em’ to retain their red velvet cake-ness.

I found out from my friend’s husband that she loves red velvet cupcakes, so I doubled em’ up so half could go to her and the other half could go to our other friend (their birthdays fall on the same day, so that worked out well). I went shopping with my neighbor yesterday to get them presents/stuff to decorate their desks. We have an apple tree on campus and on the way back, he climbed it and shook down some apples for us. (I guess I didn’t have to pick so many apples after all.) Anyway, the friends in question happen to sit almost right next to each other, so that made life easier too. Our apologies to the guy who sits in between them, but he’s cool and in any case, he gets to benefit from free food by association/proximity. :D

This one was for Pixie. Our other friend, Travis, got a pink princess party hat, with Hello Kitty/Disney princess stuff all over his desk because, yes, we are obnoxious and haven’t grown up yet. (At least we didn’t give him Barbie or My Little Pony?) Next week is our other neighbor’s birthday, so he’s going to get all kinds of obnoxious-ness as well.

Red Velvet Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting

Ingredients:
(Red Velvet Cupcakes)
-1 1/2 cups cake flour (sub with 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour + ~3 tbsp of cornstarch)
-1 cup whole wheat flour
-1/2 cup brown sugar
-1 tbsp cocoa powder
-1 tsp salt
-2 tsp baking powder
-1 tsp white vinegar
-1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
-1/4 cup butter, softened
-2 eggs
-2 tsp vanilla
-1 1/3 cup light buttermilk (sub with 1 1/3 cup soy milk + little more than 1 tbsp white vinegar or lemon juice)
-1 tbsp red food coloring

(Low Fat Cream Cheese Topping)
-4 oz low fat cream cheese
-1 tsp vanilla extract

Instructions:
1) (Red Velvet Cupcakes) Preheat oven to 350. In a large mixing bowl, stir together flours, salt, cocoa, and baking powder. In another large bowl beat sugar, applesauce and butter. Beat in eggs and vanilla. In a separate bowl mix baking soda and vinegar.
2) Add half of the dry ingredients into the egg mixture, mix well. Add buttermilk, red food coloring and mix well. Add the remaining dry ingredients and fold in vinegar and baking soda.
3)  Pour in cupcake tin 3/4 of the way. Bake for 25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean. Cool, then frost with low fat cream cheese frosting.
4) (Cream Cheese Topping) Beat together cream cheese and vanilla until smooth.

So, just to recap…

• Buttermilk substitute: milk + ~1 tbsp white vinegar or lemon juice for every cup of milk
• Cake flour substitute: all-purpose flour with ~1 tbsp cornstarch for every cup of flour

I didn’t include a picture of the cream cheese topping because it basically just looks like cream cheese. My decision to not frost the cupcakes before giving em’ to said friends is due in part to the fact that I’m not good at making stuff look pretty, but also because I myself tend to dislike having crap tons of frosting on my cupcakes and didn’t know their preference, so I got them plastic knives and left it up to them to decide, heh heh heh.

This recipe made 22 cupcakes for me. Hope you enjoy! :]