I was recently watching Martha Stewart... can't say I do it all the time :P... and it happened to be the day of her cupcake show! I had been tempted to buy the magazine off the rack in stores when it had a heart made out of yummy cupcakes :D
For the show she tried a bunch of cupcakes from different cupcake shops in New York and picked out three that she liked best. All looked amazing and I madly scrambled to write down the ingredients only to remember that - oh yeah Martha is on the interwebs... Check out the recipes and video here --> Martha's Cupcake Show
Fantabulous!!
The different people she had on the show had really great tips on how to make the batter exactly how you want it, fluffy or moist or spongy...etc.
Recently, I created what was supposed to be a pound cake from a recipe on the back of a Duncan Hines box but instead ended up with an amazingly fluffy cake-like brownie. The only thing I changed was beating the eggs by themselves on high for a few minutes. Then I added the rest of the ingredients. [ The box wanted me to unceremoniously dump all of the ingredients together at the same time ... ugh] From the show I learned a lot about how to mix a great from-scratch batter.
Happy Baking :)
PS.. This recipe from Paula Deen has been my go-to cake recipe for all of the recent functions I have been attending - AHHH mazingly delicious!! The only thing I have edited is the amount of confectioner's sugar she puts in the icing - I use only 3-4 cups vs. her 7 cups. It tastes just right and isn't too sweet. I am sure substituting peach for all of the strawberry items would be just as tasty... I am hoping to try some other ones soon :D
Its most recent incarnation was cupcakes for my husband's students' piano/guitar recital... :) I used the leftover strawberry puree from the icing in some lemonade we were serving - voila! Yummy strawberry lemonade :)
