Yellow Cake Cupcakes with Sunflowers

These were an impulse-bake. I wanted to take advantage of a few cool days here in New York and decided to give some cupcakes and decorating a go! What a loverly way to usher in fall.

The cupcakes were great, definitely on the dense side, so very similar to Magnolia's cupcakes if you have had those. The decorating was fun, too! Of course, it's from Hello, Cupcake!, of which I have several copies if you are ever in need. I am ashamed to say that I used canned frosting. BUT only because I knew it would hold its shape better than what I would have made. The sunflowers were fairly easy to make, as well, especially if you have a leaf-tip for decorating. My favorite part has to be the ladybugs...what a cute idea!



Yellow Cupcakes
The New Best Recipe

1 1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1 cup sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
1/2 cup sour cream
1 large egg, plus 2 large egg yolks, at room temperature
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Adjust an oven rack to the middle position; heat the oven to 350 degrees. Line a standard muffin tin with paper or foil liners.

Whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt in the bowl of a standing mixer. Ad the butter, sour cream, egg, yolks and vanilla and beat the wet ingredients into the dry at medium speed until smooth and satiny, about 30 seconds. Scrape down the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula and stir by hand until smooth and no flour pockets remain.

Divide the batter evenly among the cups of the prepared tin using a 2-ounce ice cream scoop or a spoon. Bake until the cupcake tops are pale gold and a toothpick or skewer isterted into the center comes out clean, 20 to 24 minutes. Use a skewer or paring knife to life the cupcakes from the tin and transfer to a wire rack; cool the cupcakes to room timperature, about 45 minutes. Makes 12 cupcakes.



For the Sunflowers
From Hello, Cupcake!

12 vanilla cupcakes
2 cans vanilla frosting
Green, yellow, orange and black food coloring
12 regular chocolate cream-filled sandwich cookies (Oreos)
12 red M&M's

Tint 1 1/2 cups of the vanilla frosting green with the food coloring. Spread an even layer of the green frosting on top of the cupcakes and smooth. I added some green sanding sugar here to the frosting, but that is entirely optional. Arrange the chocolate sandwich cookies over the cupcakes, pressing them into the frosting to secure.

Tint the remaining vanilla frosting bright yellow and with food coloring. Remove 1/2 the yellow frosting and tint it orange with the food coloring. Secure a pastry bag with a leaf tip. Spoon the orange frosting into one side of the bag and spoon the yellow frosting into the other side of the bag. Press out the excess air and seal the bag. Pipe the yllow-orange frosting around the edge of each cookie to make petals. Pipe another circle of petals just inside the first and slightly overlapping.

Tint about 1/4 cup of the vanilla frosting black with the food coloring and spoon it into a small ziplock bag. Press of the excess air and seal the bag. Snip a 1/16-inch corner from the back. Pipe a dot of black frosting on each cookies and attach the red chocolate candies to make the ladybugs. Pipe a line of black frosting down the center of each ladybug and add a dot for the head and a few dots on the back.