Berry Berry Wonderful Cupcakes!

Well I woke up today and was still quite enamored with the thoughts of continuing on my cupcake and decorating frenzy! I'm nothing if not very single minded at times and not always for the good of mankind :) Anyhow I decided I really wanted to try a vanilla cupcake recipe so I pulled out my good old Betty Crocker Cookbook (circa 1976) and the old gal didn't let me down! Inside was a very basic one egg cake (therefore easily left out and replaced with flaxseed) that I hastily put together! It was simply the simplest cake I've ever had the good fortune to make. And the raw cake batter was tasty and my little number one grandson came back for quite a few licks from the nearly scraped out bowl. That's the good thing about cooking sans eggs -- no nasty bacteria to worry about. I actually followed the recipe exactly as stated except for the obvious replacements -- soy milk and flaxseed for egg. I baked them as cupcakes and it took about 16 minutes at 350F. I had a craving for strawberry icing so I threw some strawberry jam in with the margarine, icing sugar and voila some nice light pink icing with a pleasing flavor. The possibilities for yummy "jam" icing are endless here -- grape, blueberry, peach, green apple and so on and so on! It would be fun to make a dozen cupcakes and call it the "The Strawberry Shortcake Collection of Cupcakes". For anyone not familiar with all the different characters they named them Lemon Meringue, Orange Blossom and Lime Chiffon just to give you an idea of what it was about. They were quite popular in the early 80's and there were definitely some on my daughters' shelves. We still have some kicking around in a box somewhere!


Recipe
*1-1/4 - 1-1/2 c. all-purpose flour*
1 c. sugar
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
3/4 c. soy milk
1/3 c. margarine
1 tablespoon flaxseed plus 1/4 cup soy milk
1 tsp. vanilla

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour square pan, 8 x 8 x 2 inches or 9 x 9 x 2 inches. Measure all ingredients into large mixer bowl. Blend 1/2 minute on low speed, scraping bowl constantly. Beat 3 minutes high speed scraping bowl occasionally. Pour into pan.
Bake 35 to 40 minutes or until wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool on cooling rack. If desired frost cake with your favorite icing or make it into a strawberry shortcake.
I made 12 cupcakes plus 2 (using 3 tablespoons batter per cupcake) and I baked them at 350 for about 16 minutes.


Veggie Prairie Girl Rambles
*1-1/4 or 1-1/2 cup flour? It does vary -- I don't know if it's the weather, the type of flour or the altitude but if it doesn't work for you with 1-1/4 cup re-try with 1-1/2 or go the middle route and just do 1-1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons and go from there. Read the following paragraph regarding my flour experiences!*

This might seem crazy but I've made these a few times -- sometimes with organic unbleached/pre-sifted flour (Western Family) and a few times with other flours -- it seems the best with the Western Family Brand. I don't know if it's just the pre-sifted factor that makes it a lighter flour because that seems to be the only thing different from the other flours. I tried Sunnyboy Organic Unbleached and didn't have as excellent a result as with the Western Family Brand. So I'm thinking perhaps it's the pre-sifted factor. I'll continue testing (sacrifices, sacrifices) and keep updating this post!

That cute little finger going after my icing in the pic below belongs to #1 grandson!