Birthday Cupcakes - Cooking with Kayleigh

My mom and I have miserable January birthdays.  The weather is almost always bad but this year it reached a new extreme.  I knew that she was hoping for some cupcakes from Kayleigh though, so the weekend after her birthday we headed down to their house during a snow storm.  Luckily, despite the warnings, the snow wasn't too bad and stopped before we headed back home.  Kayleigh brought maraschino cherry cupcakes. She made cupcakes similar to these last year and they reminded my mom of a cake her aunt used to make for her birthday when she was growing up.  The original recipe called for a cake mix but this year Kayleigh figured out how to make it from scratch.

Grandma watching Kayleigh make biscuits.

I should say right away - these aren't vegan.  They are dairy-free but they do contain egg whites.  We've experimented a lot with replacing whole eggs in baked products but I wasn't sure what to do when you only need the whites.  If anyone has a good substitution, please let me know.

I was in charge of the frank and beans.

While there, I made frank and beans for dinner and Kayleigh made baking powder biscuits (found in this book).  I'd say the late birthday celebration was a success even with the terrible weather!

 

Maraschino Cherry Cupcakes

2 3/4 cup flour

1 3/4 cup fine sugar (Baker's sugar)

2 tsp baking powder

1 cup vegan sour cream

1/2 cup oil

3 egg whites

1/4 cup water

1/2 tsp almond extract

2 10-oz jars of maraschino cherries, drained (we saved the juice and mixed some of it into the frosting)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Line two cupcake pans (24 cupcakes) with liners.  

Chop the cherries into a small dice (a food processor works good for this).  

In an electric mixer, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder, sour cream, oil, egg whites, water and almond extract on low for one minute to mix and then on medium speed for 2 minutes until smooth.  Fold in the cherries.  

Fill each cup 3/4 full.  Bake for 18 minutes.  Let cool and top with your favorite frosting.  (These are so moist, they aren't bad without any frosting at all.)

Grandma's gifts - soup mugs and a candle.