Pink Cupcakes for the Blues

With the weekend’s chocolate chip muffins reduced to a few crumbs and an extra layer of insulation, a long and cake-less day loomed before me.  In the four and a half hour gap between lectures, I had to cram in writing an article, reading the text for the lecture, making and eating lunch and some mindless procrastination. Time was not on my side, but my need for cake overpowered my ability to think clearly. I scavenged through my fridge and baking box and found that I had the ingredients for The Hummingbird Bakery’s mouth-wateringly sweet vanilla cupcakes.

I also found a new toy, purchased on Friday and yet to be unleashed on unsuspecting cakes: food colouring.  Bright pink and bright blue kid-in-a-candy-store food colouring.  The bottle, rather handily, came with a sensible lid which allowed only one drop at a time to prevent any pink and blue colour explosions happening.  I mixed six drops of hot pink colouring with the mixture, paused, and added some more.  I was determined that this time these cakes would be undeniably, definitely and positively pink inside.

The picture does not do the pinkness justice; the colour would have made a Barbie convention look shamefully pasty.  The colour did, however, cause a bit of confusion; on biting into it, one found oneself  thinking two things: ‘Mmm, vanilla’ and ‘Why is this cake pink but does not taste like strawberry?’ I like the colour; it was girly and fun just as I had planned. Next time, however, I think I will go for a strawberry-flavoured pink cake, because sometimes expectations are too ingrained and sensible to deny.

The other colourful fun was the blue icing. This did not go quite to plan. It is difficult to mix icing sugar in a bowl without covering the kitchen in a thin but persistent coating of fine, snow-like sweetness, which is tasty and decorative but not universally appreciated. As such, the butter and sugar were not blended as well as they should have been. Also, I threw milk in without checking the amount, because sometimes when you are making icing, your rebellious spirit kicks in and tells you ‘to hell with this need for exactness’. Turns out that although the rebellious spirit knows how to make delicious blue goo, it does not know how to make icing which is not incredibly runny when piped. The piping itself needs work, but the addition of a special pink (purple) Smartie hid this rather well, or at least distracted from it.

Sadly the cakes were not finished in time for me to take them to my last lectures. I had to make do with a massive, overpriced blueberry muffin.  However, I am pleased with the way these turned out; sweet, fun and topped with a special Smartie, they appeal to the inner child that sometimes need appeasing with cake, chocolate and confusing food colouring.