Cupcakes: The American Dream

I pledge allegiance to the greatest dessert in the America! So to celebrate our country and the love of all that is cupcake, I decided to deviate from the traditional July 4th red/white/blue cupcake and celebrate peace, love, and happiness - and fun! - of tie-dye cupcakes!

I started with dyeing white cake three different, primary colors. The slight snag that I encountered was that I used regular eggs instead of egg whites, which caused the white cake batter to turn a light yellow shade. So, to compensate I added extra dye.



Then, I put the three colors of dye in the muffin cup together, making sure that they overlapped. In the first batch, I just scooped the colors in with each other, without mixing them myself - this didn't yield any other colors (like green or orange). In the second batch, I mixed it lightly with a spoon, and I did manage to see some green.



The final effect wasn't exactly what I imagined, though, in the end, they did turn out rather patriotic looking! However, the cake part was a little bit dry - I can only conclude that because I added so much dye, it caused the cake to be more dry than usual.

My solution, in the future, would be to add a little extra oil - as the fat might help it be a little more moist - and by fat, I of course mean imaginary calories.... holiday cupcakes don't have real calories ;-)

To counteract the dryness, I cut a little cone-shaped tunnel in the center and filled it with icing - it worked very well! The icing in the center was a hit!

Of course, I only had this stroke of ingenuity after I had put a new batch of Devil's Food chocolate cupcakes in the oven... which yielded a more traditional yet still delicious 4th of July treat!


Check out these adorably patriotic, Raspberry Crystal Light-infused treats, contributed by Christyn from Bead Up!


Christyn: For these cupcakes, I used extra large, white cupcake papers. I used a box of Funfetti cupcake mix along with 2 packets of Crystal Light raspberry drink mix to make the batter red and more flavorful! After baking them (extra long since each cupcake was double it's intended size!) I took a container of Whipped Vanilla icing and mixed it up with half a container of Light Whipped Topping (generic brands - what what?). This gives the icing more spreadability and a fluffier topping. To finish, I used sprinkles from Target's One-Spot (which also go with my preferred 4th of July color scheme: http://beadup.blogspot.com/2009/07/i-love-you-wednesdays.html). They were a hit :)