Sprinkles Strawberry Cupcakes

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY! 

Hope you're spending it with someone special (romantic or not).

For this Valentine's Day I decided to try a recipe that I've been oogling for weeks now. I thought Candace Nelson's strawberry cupcakes with strawberry frosting would be the perfect treat! I've loved Sprinkles for a while now, so getting a chance to make her recipe was exciting. The cake turned out super moist and the frosting was perfectly speckled with strawberry puree. My favorite part about making these cupcakes were the fact that I could control the amount of frosting, since sometimes Sprinkle's tends to overload the sweet factor. 

Sprinkles Strawberry Cupcakes

Yields: approximately 12 - 15

Slightly modified from the original recipe, which can be found at Martha Stewart.com, from Candace Nelson

For the cupcakes:

3/4 cup of fresh or frozen strawberries, thawed

1 1/2 cups of all purpose flour, sifted

1 tsp. baking powder

1/4 tsp. coarse salt (I used regular)

1/4 cup whole milk, room temperature (I used 2%)

1 tsp. pure vanilla extract

1/2 cup or 1 stick of unsalted butter, room temperature

1 cup sugar

1 large egg, room temperature

2 large egg whites, room temperature

For the frosting:

4 tablespoons of strawberry puree (from remaining puree above)

1 cup/ 2 sticks of unsalted butter

pinch of salt

3 1/2 cups of powdered sugar, sifted

1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350 F. Line a muffin pan with cupcake liners and set aside. Place the strawberries in a food processor and pulse until pureed, it should measure up to about 1/3 cup of strawberry puree. Add a couple more strawberries for extra puree for the frosting. Set aside. 

In a medium sized bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, and salt. In another bowl, combine the milk, vanilla extract, and 1/3 cup of the strawberry puree. Using a mixer, cream the butter until light and fluffy. Next, slowly add the sugar and beat until fluffy. Slowly add the egg and egg whites until combined. Next, gradually add half of the flour mixture until blended, then the milk mixture, then the remaining flour mixture. Make sure everything is well blended, scraping down the sides of the bowl.

Pour the batter into the muffin cups, filling them 2/3 full. Bake until golden brown and when an inserted toothpick comes out clean, which will be about 20 - 25 minutes. Let the cupcakes cool completely before frosting them. 

While baking, you can make these super cute candy melt hearts! Just melt them at 30 second intervals until smooth. Use a toothpick to shape the hearts on a piece of foil. Wait until they harden and top your cupcakes with them:

For the frosting, puree the strawberries in a food processor. Using an electric mixer,  whip the butter and salt together until nice and fluffy. Slowly add the powdered sugar until well combined. Add the vanilla and 3 tbsn. of strawberry puree, mix until well blended. Now time to frost! Enjoy!