Happy New Years Eve! And a New Frosting Recipe
In case you haven’t noticed, I haven’t made many cupcakes recently. I don’t know if I just got burnt out or what, but I’ve been making more bars and cookies recently. Bars are especially low maintenance which makes them so much easier to make than cupcakes. But cupcakes will always hold a special place in my heart. And I’ll continue to make them.
I actually made these cupcakes earlier in the year for a weekend getaway to a friend’s family lake house. I thought these photos with the sprinkles were perfectly festive for New Years Eve! Hubby and I are off ringing in the new year in Las Vegas with a big group of friends!
Since it’s our first trip to Vegas, I’m sure we’ll have a bunch of fun and plenty of stories to share when we get home. But for now, lets talk more about cupcakes. For these cupcakes, I used a classic chocolate cupcake recipe but I decided to try a new frosting recipe.
I used the new neon colored cupcake liners that have been in the grocery store this year. I love them because in general, the Wilton cupcake liners that come in a bag at stores like Michaels are cute, but they always seem to be a bit off in size. The cupcake liners that I order online are great – vibrant colors and the perfect size – but they’re a bit pricey. By default, I mostly use the classic pastel colored liners that come in the round plastic container, but recently, they’ve had these neon colored ones that are great. I can’t get enough of them!
This frosting has a great bakery-frosting flavor. It’s very sweet and everyone really enjoyed it. It had a decent amount of stiffness that was perfect for piping onto cupcakes as well. I will definitely be making this frosting again.
Dawn's Buttercream
Ingredients:
1 cup Crisco
1 pound powdered sugar
1 teaspoon almond extract
2 tablespoons water
2 tablespoons meringue powder
Directions:
Cream shortening, water and flavoring.
Add powdered sugar and meringue powder. Mix until blended.
Add additional water until you reach the desired consistency. If you want really white icing be sure to use a clear extract. Vanilla extract will make the icing off white.
Recipe from Cooking with Carrie
I am Jen the Beantown Baker. Engineer by day and baking maven by night. Hubby serves as my #1 fan and official taste tester. We got hitched back in 2006. Barefoot. In the sand. With the waves crashing behind us. It was one of the best decisions we’ve ever made. 
This looks so homey and delicious!
RDQ: where should I add the cranberries? did you substitute them for the raisins? can i use fresh cranberries?
Sorry – I updated the recipe to reflect that I used dried cranberries in place of the raisins.
Looks just delicious! I’m crazy lately about cranberries too. Talk about a versatile fruit! I just used them this evening to make a cranberry-apple conserve that served as the sauce for almond-crusted pork tenderloin. It was a big hit.
I also wonder if you can use fresh cranberries since they are in season!
You could definitely make this with fresh cranberries if you wanted.
How long did you bake this if you halved it in a 8 by 8 pan? So excited to try it 🙂
I think I started checking it at 30 minutes and left it in for about 45 based on the color of the top layer.
I’ve seen this recipe around before but it never fails to look so delicious! Gorgeous flavours 🙂
Me again. It is DELICIOUS! I halved the recipe and used 1 cup of fresh cranberries, though I think I could have used more.
Thanks so much!
Glad to hear it Lisa! I will definitely have to try this with fresh cranberries next time I make it.