The Icing On The Cake: Three Cupcakes for the New Year!

It's a new year!!! Thank God. Good riddance 2010, welcome 2011, full of possibilities and hope! I also just turned 27 at the end of December. I think about where I thought my life would be when I was 27 and this is not it. I am unemployed (as is my husband), I am living in my in-laws attic, and besides our cars and the objects in our rented storage unit, I have little to my name. Despite how depressing these things can be, I have hope for better things and happiness to come in this new year.

One of the beneficial things of the past year has been my new found baking obsession. It is a coping mechanism, a creative outlet, and a happy place for me to be when things aren't going my way. I've found I love making cupcakes! Cupcakes bring a smile to my face as well as to the faces of those who eat them. My husband and I were recently visiting my family is Washington state and because we don't live close to them, I wanted to make a few cupcakes for them to enjoy while I was home. So I made cupcakes to end 2010 and to begin 2011.

First was a new red velvet cupcake recipe. It turned out to be a great recipe. And because of that, I have to keep the recipe to myself. Sorry friends, a baker has to keep some secrets to herself sometimes! I made 28 of these cupcakes and my brother at 15 of them himself, all in about 30 hours. I guess that meant he liked them!

Red velvet cupcakes with cinnamon frosting

Next, for New Years Eve, my good friend and I made chocolate cupcakes, half with peanut butter frosting and half with espresso frosting. The peanut butter frosting recipe is already posted here: Peanut Butter Cup Cupcakes and sadly, the espresso frosting wasn't as good as I had hoped. So the search is on for a good coffee/espresso frosting recipe!