BakeBakeBake

I don't know about any of you, but I absolutely LOVE rainbow cupcakes!! I made them once for work a few months ago and they were a hit! One of my co-workers approached me last week and asked me if I could make some for her daughter's birthday party. I was so excited! My first paid job! So, I documented my experience along with pictures. I've been dying to be able to contribute something to this community, so here's my chance! Please forgive me, there's a lot of pictures!






Here's documentation and photographic evidence of my very first PAID baking job!! I introduce to you...ME, the happy baker, Dana!!





I decided that I should wear my Lush apron and make the baking job official.



I find that the best way to bake is to have the recipe all laid out in front of you in a visible manner...and then have a clean & clear counter to work on. Then I gather all of my ingredients in one place and just start from there! So...we have the recipe:



Yes, I could have printed it out with the printer, but I got this journal as a "prize" at my friend's bridal shower. I've decided to just jot down recipes in it. I work better off of my own handwriting anyways...plus I needed to quadruple the recipe. So, anyways, here are the ingredients all gathered up:






I used food coloring gel this time instead of the regular liquid food coloring. So after everything was gathered together, I measured everything out and started mixing:



The dry ingredients and then the first part of the "wet" ingredients:



After that, I was really busy mixing! I have a cheap old $5 hand mixer from Wal-Mart...and it's not very big. It's quite hard to mix batter for a quadrupled recipe. That took a lot of arm work! So, since I'm making rainbow cupcakes, I needed to split the batter (really felt like dough...it was soooo thick!) into six separate bowls.



Next is my favorite part....mixing up the colors!!! I wanted these babies to be bright and intense! The last time I made these, I used the liquid food coloring, so the batter did get a little runnier because of that. However, since I'm using the gel this time, the batter remained the same thickness throughout the mixing. Needless to say, my poor arm!!! I did A LOT of mixing! Sheesh! But, it was worth it...here's the result:



I was hoping for even more intense colors than that...but I think I need to buy the neon pack for those kind of results. At least I know where I can get the food coloring gel now (Wal-Mart). So, now it was time to spoon the colors in the paper cups and get them in the oven! This part was especially difficult because of the thickness of the batter. It was very hard to get off the spoon. I do think it's best to have this kind of thickness because it allows you to make the colors chunky instead of running together...if that makes sense.



It was all a piece of cake from here! Just had to bake. I was a little worried because I seriously have never had this thick of a batter before and I didn't want them to end up rock hard or anything. But I kept peeking in the oven to see what they looked like...and they looked perfect! So without further adiou, here's the final outcome!








Aren't they beautiful?? I am SO PROUD of myself! This is my best work yet and I couldn't wait to give them to my co-worker the next morning! OK, so notice that there's only 3 dozen cupcakes here....and I made enough for 4 dozen. Crazy! Well, I had 4 extra, but nowhere close to being 4 dozen. I gave her one extra and I kept 3 here to munch on. Here's a couple up close to show the chunky colors:





Of course I had to use one to cut in half to photograph the inside (and eat...nom nom nom):





I couldn't have asked for a better result...looks-wise and taste-wise! The next morning (this past Friday morning) I brought them into my co-worker and she was SOOOO excited! It was the best feeling to see her face when she first looked at the cupcakes! They are for her daughter's birthday party and the theme is tye-dye! They're going to be tye-dying shirts and everything. These cupcakes couldn't be any more perfect! They're going to be making their own frosting...tye-dyed, of course, so I didn't have to worry about the frosting at all. I can't wait to go to work tomorrow and see how her daughter liked them!

One of the best parts of this all? Two other people at work are thinking about having me do those cupcakes for their kids' birthdays too! I'm very excited!

By the way...if you want the original recipe, here's the link: http://www.marthastewart.com/recipe/frosted-vanilla-cupcakes