It had to happen. The really belated Valentine's Day post. This is mostly because I had an odd Valentine's Day (for me at least) this year. It started with a fight, extremely sour moods, and then an extreme desire to make cupcakes. For the past forever I never celebrated Valentine's Day. Mostly because after being in grade school you no longer get free chocolate or candies and therefore, spending it alone this year should have been no different right? Well, as said above..it had a terrible start. SO! Instead of being sour I turned all my frustration in a cupcake making storm. ...Okay maybe not a storm, but nevertheless, I went out in the afternoon, got my ingredients and set up everything in my kitchen.

I am not very original. Not when I'm pissed and just want to quench my cupcake fix. I just used the magic of Google and entered whatever site came first for Red Velvet Cupcakes and Cream Cheese Frosting. I also dragged my pet turtle Mertle into my cupcake business. No, I didn't bake her into a cupcake. She just kept me company nearby.

CUPCAKES ONWARD!!

I have already mixed the the dry ingredients at this point. Not much of a mess made, but here is a picture showing the cupcake tray I used. Yes, that is a very old style sifter at the bottom left that I attempted to use but instead resulted in a strainer. Because strainers are awesome.

Here is the lovely pair of dry ingredients and the nice fatty pile of cream ingredients on the right. I don't have remotely professional looking baking supplies.

EGGS! After five of them. That's a lot of eggs.

TURTLE BREAK!! She's trying to climb out. But she can't. Aww. And for those wondering if I'm a retarded turtle owner, that's her feeding bucket, not her actual tank. I fed her (you can also see bits of lettuce she refused to eat because she is a fatty).

FOOD DYE TIME!!! Looks like I just killed someone. I love that.

 

The recipe says one teaspoon of red food dye. I put in one and a half teaspoons of red food dye and it still didn't seem red enough.

Okay! Ready to put the batter in! The little cupcake wraps are so cute. <3

 

I don't have pictures for putting the cupcakes in but after my first batch of twenty four little cupcakes were put in I worked on the frosting This part was so much easier and the results are so nice.

 

First Batch done. They aren't all even but they are all so cute and tiny. :3

CUPCAKE TOWER!!!

And finally, the batter was much more than I thought it would be. Simple math does not always come easy.
In the end I made 102 cupcakes. 96 small ones and 6 normal sized ones. Several got eaten in the middle of the process when I was "testing" them.

Anyhow! Here's the glory run off cupcakes I made! I am not a baker. I do not usually have successful baking projects even though I adore sweets to death. Most the time something goes completely wrong because I forget an ingredient, order of ingredients, or the correct measurements. Despite my history of screw ups I persevere. And I don't think these cupcakes turned out half bad.

Just a warning. The recipe was made for normal sized cupcakes but I was using a smaller size cupcake pan, because I just prefer tiny cupcakes. Therefore, the timing in the oven has to be cut in half. My first batch was 20 minutes. I tried them and realized they were to dry, because they were a smaller size. The second batch was 15 minutes. Softer, but not enough. I settled on 11 minutes for my third and fourth batch. They came out wonderfully.

I also happened to have burned my fingers when taking out the pan of regular sized cupcakes from the oven. I didn't want to drop them on the floor so I held on to it longer than I should have  giving it enough time to be settled on the floor at a small distance than if I was standing. So, I got lovely burns on three of my fingers. DO NOT RUN IT UNDER COLD WATER. That burns. Like an ax to your face. But not really. I put ice on to numb it enough so I could put frosting on the cupcakes (YES my priorities were the cupcakes not my fingers). After which I proceeded to put on everything cool in the house on my fingers. Aloe Vera gel. Aloe Vera lotion. More ice. Aloe Vera leaves ( a lot harder to apply than it seems). I am pretty good at tolerating pain though. So by the next day it was barely anything to worry about. It just looked and felt funny.

Anyway I hope everyone had a wonderful Valentine's Day.
Love, live long, and prosper!! <3 <3