Cherries and Cream Cupcake

These are the cupcakes I promised to post for you. This is the second flavor I made to bring to work on V-Day. Ok my inspiration for this honestly was a bottle of soda I had seen. It was Cherry n cream flavor. I thought hmmm that would make a good cupcake and well this is the result. This is a Cherry filled vanilla bean cake topped with super white swirled sparkly pink buttercream icing with a cherry on top. Yea that's a mouth full but really I spent a full week dreaming of making these and how they would turn out. I'm pretty happy to report that they actually turned out as pretty as I imagined them.

I was making these the same time I was making the red velvet so please forgive me, I did not take pictures of every step like maybe I should have. These are a little bit more involved then mix and scoop but I am incredibly happy with the process.

Ingredients for the cupcake:
1 ½ cups + 2 tablespoons cake flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
1 cup sugar
1 egg
2 egg whites or 4 tbsp egg substitute
1/2 cup milk
1/4 cup sour cream
1 1/2 teaspoons of pure vanilla extract
1 vanilla bean (you could leave this out but it is soooo worth it to use)
1 can cherry pie filling (you can make your own but I used the canned stuff this time)
 **Preheat Oven 350 degrees**

1. In a sauce pan heat milk , split and scrape vanilla bean into milk, place empty pod in milk also. Slowly heat to just under a simmer for several minutes take care not to scald. Take off heat and let steep and cool. Remove empty pod and set aside to dry.
2. Beat the butter for about 3 minutes on medium speed, then add the sugar and beat until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes.
3. Add the egg and beat for 30 seconds. Add the egg whites, one at a time, beating for 30 seconds each.
4. In one bowl sift together the flour, baking powder, and salt. In another whisk together the vanilla steeped milk, vanilla extract, and sour cream.
5. Add the flour mixture and the milk mixture to the butter sugar egg mixture in alternating additions (dry-wet-dry method), starting and ending with the flour. Mix until just combined being sure to not over beat.
6. Divide the batter into cupcake papers in a muffin tin and bake at 350F for 18-20 minutes or until slightly golden brown. Tops may seem soft to the touch but will harden as they cool.
7. Set on wire rack to completely cool before frosting.
8. Once cool using a paring knife cut a hole in the middle of the cupcake from the top. Do not discard "lids" as you will replace after filling. You can also use a cupcake corer if you have one handy.
9. Fill with a small amout of filling, do not over fill as it will ooze out when you put the lid back on. Place lids back on and set aside for icing.

Icing:
1 1/2 sticks butter
2 tsp vanilla extract
4 cups powdered sugar (I had used 5 but was told it was to sweet so I cut back the recipe)
white food coloring

1. Whip butter in electric mixer until light and fluffy
2. Add Vanilla extract and mix to combine.
3. Add powdered sugar one cup at a time
4. Add as much/little white food coloring as you want. Remember to incorporate this fully throughout the whole icing, you may need to mix by hand.
5. Whip icing until light and fluffy

10. Spread/pipe icing on cupcakes as you wish. I piped mine on using a start tip in a circular motion. I used sparkly pink icing gel made by wilton (can be purchased at Michaels) and used the same technique as in my chocolate peppermint cupcake recipe. Make a few stripes of Pink inside the piping bag fill with super white icing. the pink will naturally swirl in when you squeeze out the icing onto the cupcakes.
11. Top with a cherry :)

Reviews: Well there wern't any left....the day I made them they were super good but it seemed the longer they sat the sweeter the icing turned. I had used 5 cups of powdered sugar so I listed the recipe as 4 cups. 

Enjoy!
<3 Laura ^.^