When I make cupcakes for someone's birthday I always ask them what their favorite flavor is. It gives me a chance to make a new recipe and sometimes I find some real gems that way. Melissa asked for Funfetti with cherry frosting, which was a boxed cake and canned frosting that I would bring in on the occasional Friday at work for Funfetti Friday, because cake makes everything better. She also said that she liked lemon flavored cupcakes, so I knew that my Lemon Curd Cupcakes would be on the menu. I know that there are two kinds of people, those who like flavors like cherry and lemon in cake and those that don't. I figured I'd throw in some chocolate cupcakes with Nutella frosting for the purists.
I couldn't make two fantastic cupcakes and then bring a boxed cupcakes along with them no matter how good they were. So I jumped on Pinterest and found some cake-box-hacks that make a boxed cake mix taste like homemade. I also saw some pins on how to make your own, but since I was going to make all three of these in one night I figured I needed a break on something. That didn't mean I was going to go canned for the frosting however and decided to make a cherry cream cheese frosting.
That's right I pulled a 5 hour cupcake baking marathon that proved to me there's no way I'm leaving my day job to do this full time. I worked a full day and then came home and baked and frosted from 4:30 until 9:30. I only have one mixing bowl for my Kitchen Aid mixer so I had to make a cake, wash the bowl, make another cake, wash the bowl, make the last cake, wash the bowl, make the first frosting, wash the bowl, make the second frosting, wash the bowl, make the last frosting and throw the bowl in the sink because I was not washing it one more time. I did get to use my awesome new scoop for dishing out batter which was nice. It was just an eye on the prize kind of adventure with the prize being my warm bed at the end of it all. I did learn some things though. I think that homemade cupcakes are better than even that cake-box-hack. I felt that the frosting shown and the cake was meh. So unless there are some serious additions that go into the recipe (as the Lemon Curd Cupcakes do) it just not really worth it and it doesn't save that much time.
I also learned that lower fat cream cheese is not ideal for making frosting with unless the butter/cream cheese ratio is upped. On the lemon cream cheese frosting I used two bricks of cream cheese to one stick of butter. No matter how much powdered sugar I added or beating I did would make that frosting stand up. It was like soft serve ice cream. Boo. So when I went to make up my cherry cream cheese frosting I only used one brick cream cheese to one stick of butter. It made a big difference. So now if you've read down this far, I shall reward you with that wonderful recipe!
Carrie's Cherry Cream Cheese Frosting
1 brick of cream cheese
1 stick of butter
2 tsp cherry extract
4-5 drops red food coloring (or as much to get the color you want)
3-5 cups powdered sugar
Bring cream cheese and butter to room temperature. Blend until creamy in a mixer. Add cherry extract and mix well. Add powdered sugar 1 cup at a time until you reach your desired thickness. Near the end of add all the sugar, add the food coloring. If it's too dark it will lighten up as you add more sugar. Frost your cupcakes and enjoy!
I even bought a cupcake stand to display them all since I thought just setting out 60+ cupcakes was kind of a let down and they needed more of a send off than that. But I forgot to bring my camera to the shower and so you'll have to put up with an iPhone shot instead.
But seriously. Get out there and make some cherry frosting!
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