My Cupcakes Overfloweth

It's the eve of my first born's first birthday. I could write some sappy post about how having a child has changed me or how I now truly understand how deeply a parent loves their child etc etc.

I'm not though. Instead, I'm going to whine about cupcakes.

In all fairness to Betty Crocker and the universe, I should have known better. I've never actually made cupcakes before and the night before Caleb's birthday party probably wasn't the time to start. I've had twelve months to prepare for this but I assumed that if I was a.) capable of reading and following instructions and b.) somewhat knowledgeable about cooking that making cupcakes couldn't be that hard.

Apparently, I was wrong.



My first batch (chocolate) turned out fine. I just didn't realize that a box mix made 24 instead of 12. I only own one muffin pan. Annoying. I then decided to make Caleb's cake and unfortunately his cakes were coming out of the oven at the exact time my second batch of cupcakes were whirling away in the mixer. The result was that the cupcake batter got slightly over mixed and gave stiff peak new meaning. They spilled over quite a bit and my yellow cupcakes resembled portabella mushrooms by the time they emerged from the oven. My sweet father-in-law assured me they were fine and taught me how to say "mushroom cloud" in Spanish.

I decided to do the only logical thing (no, not eat all 12 by myself before anyone saw them - although I did consider it) and perform a round of cupcake plastic surgery. My husband came home to a super stressed wife standing over the kitchen sink with a dull steak knife and a dozen sheared mushroom cloud cupcakes. He backed away slowly.

Adriana was gracious enough to help me frost them and I have to say that the end result wasn't nearly as bad as I'd feared. The rest of the yellow cupcakes came out nicely, mostly because the mix had time to settle while the first set were in the oven.



So, happy birthday eve to my little man. I'm a hell of a lot more comfortable tonight than I was a year ago. And perhaps next year a HEB cake might not seem like such a bad idea...