Long Distance Baking Project #2

February is almost over! I can hardly believe it!

This month was Amber's month to choose. She chose Red Velvet Cupcakes with Cream Cheese icing! The recipe came from another baker at heart, Angela Bennett. I LOVE that Angela has been participating in our baking adventure. She lives in Louisville and Amber gets to spend lots of time with Angela and her family. Strangely I have known of Angela for many years as her dad was one of my professors at Lincoln Christian College. He was also my home church's interim minister until her brother Scott came to be our Senior Minister. It's a small world, huh?

Disclaimer: I did not read the recipe completely before I purchased the food coloring!! I bought a bottle of red food coloring, however I bought the .25 oz bottle, not the 1 oz. bottle. Oops! Good thing the food coloring doesn't affect the taste, as these cupcakes are divine!

February's Recipe:
Red Velvet Cupcakes
2 1/2 cups flour
1/2 cup cocoa powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup softened butter
2 cups sugar
4 eggs
1 cup sour cream
1/2 cup milk
1 bottle (1 oz.) McCormick Red Food Color
2 tsp pure vanilla extract

Cream Cheese Frosting
1 pkg (8 oz) softened cream cheese
2 sticks softened salted butter
2 tsp. vanilla
2 lbs powdered sugard


1) Preheat oven to 350. Line cupcake tin with liners.
In a medium bowl, combine flour, cocoa, baking soda, and salt.

2) Beat butter and sugar in large bowl with electric mixer on medium speed 5 minutes or until light and
fluffy. Beat in eggs, 1 at a time. Mix in sour cream, milk, food color, and
vanilla.

3) Gradually beat in flour mixture on low speed just until blended.

4) Spoon batter into paper-lined muffin cups, filling each cup 2/3 full. Bake in preheated oven 20 to 25 minutes.
Cool in pans 5 minutes. Remove from pans; cool completely.

5) Meanwhile, prepare frosting.
In a medium bowl beat butter and cream cheese on medium speed until combined. Gradually add the sugar. Beat first 3 ingredients until smooth. Gradually beat in powdered sugar. If frosting is too stiff, add 1 tbsp water at a time until desired consistency.

6) Spread or pipe on frosting.

Makes 30 regular size cupcakes













Amber's Name: Red Velvet Crush Cupcakes

Sara's Name: Flirting with Red Velvet Cupcakes or Slightly Interested in Red Velvet Cupcakes

Long Distance Baking Project #1

We are off to a great start! I chose the recipe this month. It just so happened that without knowing it we decided to bake our cupcakes on the same day!

Though I presented my cupcakes pretty well, Amber went the extra mile and put her cupcakes to the test in front of a panel of 3 judges. She’s so cool.


January’s Recipe:
Chocolate Cupcakes (From Nestle Cocoa Box)
2 cups all purpose flour
2/3 cup Nestle Toll House Baking Cocoa (I substituted ¾ Hershey’s dark chocolate cocoa)
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
½ tsp salt
¾ cup butter, softened
1 ¾ cups granulated sugar (I used 2 cups sugar w/dark chocolate cocoa)
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 large eggs
1 cup water

Peanut Butter Frosting (From the kitchen of Angela Bennett)
½ cup butter, softened
1 cup creamy peanut butter
3 Tbls milk, or as needed
2 cups powdered sugar

1) Preheat over to 350. Line cupcake tins with liners.
In a medium bowl combine flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
Set aside.

2) In a large mixing bowl, cream butter, granulated sugar, and vanilla. Beat in eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Gradually beat in the flour mixture alternately with water.

3) Fill paper-lined muffin cups 2/3 full of batter. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until wooden toothpick inserted in centers comes out clean. Remove cupcakes from the tin and cool on a wire rack. Repeat with the next dozen.

4) Meanwhile, prepare frosting.
In a medium bowl beat butter and peanut butter on medium speed until combined. Gradually add the sugar. As it gets thick alternate with milk one Tbls at a time until sugar is completely mixed in. Beat at least 3 minutes until it gets creamy and fluffy.

5) Spread or pipe frosting on top of each cupcake.

Makes 2 dozen regular cupcakes or 1 dozen large cupcakes













Amber’s Name: Not Yo Momma’s Reese’s Cup…Cake

Sara’s Name: Dark Chocolate-y Peanut Butter-y Bomb Diggit-y Cupcake

I can hardly wait until February!

Accountability Baking!

If we’re friends on facebook, or if you look back at my most recent blog posts, you know that I love food! I’m not overly creative with my food. I mostly like good ol’e home cooking from scratch, which always includes a good baked good or two! Not sure why I have this obsession, but I decided to just embrace it and share it.

One way I’m going to embrace my obsession with baked goods is through what I like to call accountability baking!

I have a friend named Amber.


Things that make our friendship special:
• Jr High Believe and a bird named Presley made us friends.
• My boss now, used to be her boss.
• She’s a huge Webb City Cardinals fan! You can tell by the sticker in the back window of her car.
• She lives in the same town as my in-laws.
• She can convince me to do things I wouldn’t normally do, but don’t tell her that.
• She makes me laugh out loud on a regular basis.
• She shares her mom’s chex mix with me!
• We love animals.
• We have lots of inside jokes.
• We have impromptu lunch appointments, at least every other week.
• We love details, systems and rules.
• We love to be creative with our gift giving.
• We love themed texting wars.
• We love to bake and share!

Thing that makes our friendship difficult:
• We live 9 hours away from each other!

One night during one of our many texting conversations, while I was watching Cupcake Wars, Fabulous Cakes, Cake Boss: Next Great Baker, etc., she asked me if I had ever tried making any of the recipes I saw for cupcakes on tv.

I told her I wasn’t brave enough to try some of their crazy recipes and that I needed a good reason to bake a lot of cupcakes, otherwise Jon & I would eat them all by ourselves. So I asked her if she wanted to come over to help me bake & eat. That answer is always yes. However as I mentioned, she lives 9 hours away. We both got sad for a moment. Then Amber in her brilliance suggested a plan for us to bake “together” anyway.

She calls it “Sara n Amber’s Cupcake A Month Long Distance Baking Project” or “Greatest Idea Eva”

Because we are a “couple of willy nilly-less girls” (her phrasing) here are our guidelines:
• Bake a different kind of cupcake each month for an entire year, me from MO and her from KY.
• Both bake the same recipes. One month I choose, the next month she chooses.
• All recipes are from scratch; variations are allowed.
• Creativity is highly encouraged.
• We must name our cupcakes as if we were selling them!
• Have fun and bake lots of cupcakes!!!

I can hardly wait! 12 yummy recipes and pictures to come!