Somewhere over the rainbow (cupcakes)

My son's fascination on rainbows at that time gave me the idea to make some colorful rainbow cupcakes for him.  And so I went on a recipe hunt again but this time I used my Allrecipes app in my iPad and I came across this:

Rainbow cupcake recipe

The cupcake in the photo looks really nice so I tried making these cupcakes with this recipe and this is what mine looked like:

The batter...it kinda took me around 8 to 10 drops of food coloring for each in order for me to achieve the intensity of the color that I want.  Also, I found the batter too thick so it was a bit of a task pouring them in the cups.

The first batch...I was actually happy with the way it looks like when I took them out of the oven.  I feel like a kid in awe while I was taking it out from the oven because the colors were really striking!  But nothing can top my son's wide-eyed reaction when he saw them :-)

Being my OC self, I wasn't so happy with how the batter rose this way.  It rose too high or maybe I've just put too much batter in the cup.  Having it this way made it hard for me to put frosting and decor on the cupcake so I just left this batch this way.

Here's a photo of my son with his rainbow cupcakes.  He couldn't wait til it cools down to taste it.  He grabbed one as soon as the cupcakes were warm enough to hold.  I got envious and so I got one myself and tasted it...

I wasn't really too happy with the taste.  Yes it looks really nice but it was a bit hard.  I'm not sure though if it's because I overbaked them but I have a feeling that it really is because of the ingredients in the recipe.  It wasn't the moist type of cupcake that I was looking for.  And so I noted to myself to search for the best vanilla cupcake recipe there is and try this again.  I will be posting another blog on how that quest turned out.  I have to go back to work :-) (As in office work!)...

How it all started...

My love for cupcakes started a few months during one of those long weekends.  I was thinking of an activity that I could do with my eldest son during the said weekend and it occurred to me that it would actually be nice to do some baking with him.  And so I went on a net hunt for a good cupcake recipe and I came across the name "Red Velvet Cupcakes".  I really got curious because I have always been hearing people raving about these red velvet cupcakes and so I decided to make some.

I got this recipe from this link:

http://www.yummy.ph/recipe/red-velvet-cupcakes-with-cream-cheese-frosting-and-chocolate-heart-toppers

I must say that it was actually a good recipe.  I was happy with the result but the preparation was really messy!  Especially when I added the red food coloring!!!

But everything was all worth it when we finally got to taste it!  Although I must say that I love it more a few days after it was baked.  It was more moist after about a day or two.

For the toppings in the photo above, I actually just grated some dark Lindt chocolate that has been ignored because it was really to bitter to eat alone.  But I must say it was put to good use at that time because it balanced the sweetness of the cupcake.

Now that I'm looking at the photo I am actually craving for some red velvet cupcakes!  I think I will bake some over the weekend :-D