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. 
These look fantastic!
my husbands family calls them butter-gooey cake.
Hi! These are actually called Gooey Butter Cakes, and they are a Paula Deen recipe (hence the butter and cream cheese!) I love making them with a red velvet cake mix….so good.
Ooey gooey butter cakes have been around for decades – they started in St. Louis – very close to my hometown. I remember making this recipe years before Paula came on the scene. She just made them more famous! Everyone goes nuts when you make them – I make them with all kinds of flavors – pineapple, lemon etc. Yours look great.
Thanks for all the information about where the bars originate from. Wherever they came from, they sure are good. I saw some comments on the allrecipes.com link of variations that people have tried like swirling in some berries and using chocolate cake mix. Kind of like a cheesecake brownie
Here in Kentucky they’re called Chess bars and have been around for a very long time. I’m not a native to KY and a coworker introduced me to these. I looked at them and thought “What the heck is that?” but once I tried one I was HOOKED! I just love how simple they are to make.
Whatever you call them, they’re pretty darned good!
YUM! Those look really delicious. And I love the colors you always put in the background.; The blue with the orange tint of the abrs is just perfect!
Yours looks like how my first and only batch turned out but I think I’d like them better gooey and with a little less sugar.
~ingrid
Yum…I love these things!
These look delicious! And I love using boxed cake mix!
I made these for a friends birthday this past weekend and they were a big hit!
I just made these today and they are delicious! I left mine slightly gooey and it’s so good!
I love these bars!
ust made these, yum! But I am curious to know where I can find some variations, i.e., with nuts, chocolate, fruit flavored, etc……I love to experiment!
beantownbaker — March 16th, 2013 @ 2:49 pm
I haven’t had a chance to play around myself with this recipe. I’m sure if you searched online, you’d find some other variations. Let me know what you try!
My mom used to make them for us when I was little. I am 25 now. And I am pretty sure they have been around for quite some time. Paula Deen probably only highlighted the fact that they were around. But yes Yum!
Good post. I learn something totally new and challenging on sites I stumbleupon everyday.
It’s always interesting to read through articles from other writers and practice something from other sites.
How can you make these to taste like pumpkin? If you add in pumpkin, do you need to cut back on something else??
beantownbaker — September 26th, 2013 @ 10:33 am
Oh that’s a great thought… What about using a box of pumpkin cake mix? And then throwing some pumpkin spices in the cream cheese mixture? If you try this variation, definitely let me know how it turns out!
Omg these look amazing cannot wait to try! I will experiment though!
beantownbaker — September 2nd, 2014 @ 7:08 pm
If you do, let me know how it goes!
This has been around for years and yes it came from a Philly box. Was a family tradition for holidays at our house, but you can make with lemon as well
beantownbaker — September 2nd, 2014 @ 7:31 pm
Good to know!
I have been making these for years…but I dust with powdered sugar when cool. I can’t go to a family function without taking them.We call them Butter Cheese Squares.
I have made these for over 20 some years. I mix pecan pieces in the crust. Family just loves them. Making them tomorrow.
I make mine with Butter Pecan Cake mix and they are awesome. I am trying lemon this weekend.