The Pink Cupcake!

I baked the cupcake....Bishops poundcake from the original Silver Palate, nice and moist and dense, then I iced the cupcake, about 15 times to get the perfect swirl, with regular old buttercream icing made of Amish butter (always salted for me) and confectioner's/icing sugar with a little bit of beetroot powder from the Belfast Food Co-op...the taste of red dye #5 leaves a horrid taste in my mouth so I tried this and sadly wasn't that impressed....hey, but I tried!! THEN I photographed the cupcake, as above, then I added a cherry via Photoshop, then I ate the cake and it's companions, then..................
...I illustrated the cupcake and now I feel that Pattern Patisserie is finally christened with true illustration and cake combined!!! Hooray!!

For my Cafe Press online store I did the cupcake two ways...the one with lettering for Valentine's Day and the regular one above for your average cupcake fanatic, who are out there in droves, any time of the year!!
Here I am illustrating the lettering for the Valentine's 'edition'. I am planning on doing a series of these bake, photograph, eat, illustrate dessert paintings...do you have any suggestions?

Now I must go and maybe make some more cupcakes as I am drooling looking at these pictures......Happy Cupcakeing to you all!!!

BISHOP'S CAKE RECIPE..simple and delicious!!

Ingredients:

8 oz (2 sticks) butter, I always use salted but I know a lot of people use sweet...your choice

2 cups granulated sugar

2 cups unbleached flour

1 teaspoon vanilla extract (essence)

5 eggs

1. Preheat oven to 350F and have your cupcake cases ready to go...

2. Cream butter and sugar together 'til fluffy and light

3. Sift flour and fold in to butter mix gently and just enough to blend

4. Add vanilla and blend, then add eggs one by one and mix well but gently after each addition

5. Fill cupcake cases 2/3 full and bake 'til a skewer comes out clean. Check after 25 minutes....for the full size cake the time is 1 hour and 15 minutes so for the cupcakes you need to guesstimate as they'll vary with the size of cupcake you are making.

6. I iced mine with plain old buttercream but you can go any way you want!!!

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