White Cake - The Way the Cookie Crumbles

I have finally found a winner!  YEAH!  I took a major hit on my diet while testing all these recipes so I'm glad the search is over.  There are three recipes on this post from The Way the Cookie Crumbles.  It was a great to know I wasn't the only one struggling to find the perfect recipe.  I made the third recipe, which was her variation on the other two.  EXCEPT, I used buttermilk instead of milk and did all vanilla extract, no almond.  They had delicious flavor, were super moist and were dense.  I've decided I don't like airy cupcakes. Blah.  I made 24 cupcakes with the batter, but filled them too full for my liking.  Next time I need to only do them a scant 2/3 full.  Baked them for only 13-14 minutes.  Some of them came out just overdone and some came out just slightly underdone.  Regardless, all of them tasted delicious. 

I took some to my Mom and sisters last Thursday night for taste testing and they all agreed they were top rate cupcakes.  SO happy!

I topped them with a Brown Sugar Cream Cheese Frosting from Beantwon Baker.  I'm not sure why I tried this frosting recipe, because clearly from the photos it's not a "stiff" frosting.  I was just too intrigued by the brown sugar part.  The frosting was VERY yummy.  I loved it.  But it's no dice for frosting cupcakes that need to hold their shape.  It's a keeper for regular situations though!

Over the weekend I also retested the Swiss meringue frosting i had in the fridge.  I left it out to get room temp and rewhipped it up.  It held it's shape pretty well and isn't too sweet which is a requirement for Kahly.

I also made another frosting to go on Kahly's family birthday cake on Saturday.  I made Mel's Kitchen Cafe Magic Frosting.  This was another fabulous frosting.  Not too sweet, very creamy, great flavor.  I used it to fill and cover a three tiered rectangle cake.  I took my time frosting the outside of the cake, trying to determine if it would be doable for Kahly's cutting cake.  I wasn't able to get it perfectly smooth like I want.  So I think I'm going to try another swiss buttercream recipe to see if it works better.  The non-fondant covered tier cake is the part that is scaring me the most about this whole endeavor.  I want it to look good!

Cakes, DONE.  Frosting, still working on it. 

I started working on the gumpaste letters and flowers today and just got back from buying a bunch more cake decorating tools.  I love doing this stuff, so fun!