Red Velvet Cupcakes

Today I decided to deviate from The Cookbook and bake a recipe from my mom's collection with the help of my friend Sidney, you can find her over at Bronzera. She has a cool blog devoted to clean living and eating and it's def worth checking out! With that being being said...these cupcakes are NOT clean but they are deliciously tasty and everyone deserves a cheat day or two right?! Anywho...back to business....my mom's recipe is for a two layer 9 inch round cake but I always make cupcakes. They're waaaaaay smaller than the slice of cake that I would cut(gotta watch the waistline ya know) and I feel like they last longer. I could be biased but I definitely think that this is the best recipe ever. I know that traditional Red Velvet recipes include chocolate but when I was kid I HATED chocolate so I always requested that my mom exclude it. As cupcakes, this recipe will yield between 20 and 24 cupcakes.

Red Velvet Cupcakes:

3          large eggs (room temperature)

1 ⅔     cups sugar

1 ½     cups vegetable oil

2 ½     cups self rising flour (sifted)

1 ½     tsp vanilla extract

1          tsp white vinegar

1          cup buttermilk

½        1 oz. bottle red food coloring

Vanilla Cream Cheese Frosting:

2          8 oz. pkgs. cream cheese

1          stick unsalted butter

2          cups  powdered sugar

½        cup slivered almonds

1          tsp vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350°F. 

Using a mixing spoon, stir the eggs and sugar together. Add in the oil and flour and stir until to well blended(according to my mom you should stir 200 times.....yes she counts her strokes). *The batter will be a little bit hard to stir but just use that elbow and push through!* 

Add in the vanilla, vinegar and buttermilk and stir until just blended.

Next, squeeze in the red food coloring. *If you like super red red velvet then you will use somewhere between half and three fourths of the bottle. If you like lighter red velvet then you can add color until you get the color you desire*

Spoon batter into 20-24 paper lined muffin cups, filling each cup a little over half full.

Bake for about 15-20 minutes or until an inserted knife or toothpicks comes out clean. Allow the cupcakes to cool and then frost Vanilla Cream Cheese Frosting.

While the cupcakes are baking go ahead and make the frosting.

Using a hand mixer, cream the butter and cream cheese together. 

Slowly add in the powdered sugar. *At this point I usually put the mixer down and continue on mixing with a spoon because the powdered sugar always ends up leaving a fine layer on everything within 2 feet of me*  

Lastly, smash up the slivered almonds a bit and add those along with the vanilla extract and stir until the almonds are distributed in the frosting. *If the frosting isn't as stiff as you'd like you can either add more powdered sugar or pop the frosting in the fridge for about 10 minutes* 

Enjoy!

-DJ