Food Porn Friday: Everything's better with sour cream

Yes, even cupcakes.

Ok, I can't take total credit for these beauties. I got the recipe for the cakes from Anne Burrell's Secrets of a Restaurant Chef.  Yes, I'm slightly obsessed with the Food Network.. there's something relaxing about watching someone cook, right? Plus, you get a lot of ideas.

Anyway, she was making sour cream cupcakes with chocolate buttercream frosting for a kid's birthday party. And, turns out, I've been on the lookout for a good basic cupcake recipe for G's upcoming 1st birthday party, which I'll be turning into Elmo faces (yeah, stay tuned for that.) The cake really turned out great, kind of dense, but with a really mild vanilla flavor.. and super easy to make. Oh - and ya know what else makes baking easier?

Ohhh yeah.. the bonus of having a bigger kitchen means finalllllllllllllllllly being able to bring out my Kitchen Aid mixer! A most amazing wedding gift (thanks Norm & Gail!) that's been sitting in our garage for oh, well over two years. Aside from the small learning curve (i.e. careful when dumping flour in there at high speeds) it was very easy to use and made the baking process so much more fun.


Anne Burrell's Sour Cream cupcakes

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• Pinch salt
• 1 1/2 sticks unsalted butter at room temperature
• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 3 eggs
• 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup milk
• 3/4 cup sour cream

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

Combine the flour, baking powder and salt in a large bowl. Reserve.

In the bowl of a stand mixer combine the butter and sugar. Using the paddle attachment beat the butter and sugar together until they are light and fluffy. Turn the mixer off and scrape down the sides of the bowl.

Beat in the eggs, 1 at a time. Slowly add the vanilla, milk and sour cream. Scrape down the sides of the bowl, as needed. With the mixer on medium speed, gradually mix in the flour.

Line a muffin tin with paper muffin cups. Fill the muffin cups about 2/3 of the way, dividing the batter evenly among the lined cups.

Put in the preheated oven and bake for about 20 minutes. Check about halfway through the baking process to make sure everything is going along great and also rotate.
The cupcakes are done when a toothpick comes out clean.

Anne used a chocolate buttercream frosting that looked delicious, but the reviews on foodnetwork.com were less than stellar. Three sticks of butter to 1/2 cup powdered sugar? Possible recipe misprint?? Anyway, I found this recipe on another blogger site, and it was WONDERFUL.


Chocolate Buttercream Frosting

• 1 cup unsalted butter (2 sticks or 1/2 pound), softened (but not melted!)
• 3 1/2 cups confectioners (powdered) sugar
• 1/2 cup cocoa powder
• 1/2 teaspoon table salt
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract or 1 teaspoon almond extract
• 4 tablespoons milk or heavy cream

Instructions

1. Cream butter for a few minutes in a mixer with the paddle attachment on medium speed. Turn off the mixer. Sift 3 cups powdered sugar and cocoa into the mixing bowl. Turn your mixer on the lowest speed (so the dry ingredients do not blow everywhere) until the sugar and cocoa are absorbed by the butter. Increase mixer speed to medium and add vanilla extract, salt, and milk/cream and beat for 3 minutes. If your frosting needs a more stiff consistency, add a little more sugar. If your frosting needs to be thinned out, add additional milk 1 tablespoon at a time.

 I used 1% milk simply because that's what I had. I think cream would probably just make it that much better.

In the future, I might add a little almond extract to the cake, as I think it would give it a little more flavor. Plus, I just love almond extract.
But they were pretty delicious as is.. so I had two yesterday. And I might do it again today.
Happy Labor day to me.