Classic Chewy Chocolate Chip Brownies

Disclaimer: if you don't like chocolate, stop reading now.

Okay, so I've still got you reading, right? That's what I thought.

Just about a year ago, I went to San Francisco with two of my best friends, Vianna and Alex. We had an absolutely amazing trip, with highlights including the Redwoods in Muir Woods, wine tasting in Sonoma Valley, visiting our friend Kelcie at Stanford, a tour of Alcatraz, and of course Ghirardelli Chocolate. Unfortunately, my friend Alex does not like chocolate - so she falls into the category of people who were warned to stop reading at the beginning of this post. Despite the fact that Alex may not have been quite as excited as me and Vianna to visit a chocolate store, we went to Ghirardelli Square in Fisherman's Wharf to go to the flagship Ghirardelli store. There, we sampled some of the chocolates, watched chocolate being made, and made just a few purchases to bring home with us...

I was feeling a bit nostalgic for San Francisco when I set out to bake dessert for some of my friends this weekend. When I decided on brownies, I remembered that Ghirardelli has the one exception to my no-baking-with-a-mix rule: their Triple Chocolate Brownie Mix. Dear readers, don't be fooled - this isn't a post about baking from a mix. I reached the conclusion that if Ghirardelli makes such a good brownie mix, they must also have a good brownie recipe. And I was not disappointed. If you don't want to take the time to make these brownies from scratch, by all means, buy the mix as it's delicious. As far as I know, in Canada (or maybe its just Ontario, or Toronto for sure) you can only buy this product at Costco - which means you get enough mixes for 6 batches. That's a lot of brownies, but I can think of much worse things to buy in bulk. If you're like me and you don't have a Costco membership, and you like to bake your own desserts anyways - here's a pretty unbeatable recipe, from Ghirardelli.

THE RECIPE:

1/2 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
4 ounces semi-sweet chocolate
1/2 cup unsalted butter, cut into pieces
1 cup brown sugar, firmly packed
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
2 large eggs
3/4 cups plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
A pinch of salt

The brown sugar reminded me of a heart

1. Preheat oven to 350 F. Grease an 8" square pan.
2. Chop the 4 ounces of semi-sweet chocolate into small pieces. In a double boiler (or a small pot onto of a bigger pot with boiling water, if you don't have a double boiler like me - or you can use a heatproof bowl in a pot of simmering water) - melt the chocolate and butter, stirring occasionally, until smooth.
3. Remove the pan from heat and allow to cool to room temperature. Stir the brown sugar and vanilla into the chocolate mixture. Add eggs and mix well.
4. In a separate bowl, combine the flour, baking powder and salt. Slowly fold the flour mixture into the chocolate mixture, until all the flour is incorporated.
5. Stir in the chocolate chips and pour the batter into the prepared pan.
6. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes, until a tester comes out clean.
7. Remove from oven and allow to cool before cutting.

Chocolate chips in chocolate - the best.

I love that these brownies have chocolate chips in them. They're chewy and extra chocolatey and just what a brownie should be. You can make them with Ghirardelli semi-sweet chocolate and chocolate chips, but they'll still be delicious with your regular Bakers chocolate and Chipits chocolate chips.

Happy Eating!

Caroline

Moroccan Almond Cookies

Also known as Chopped Almonds Ghribas...

Three-day weekends are the best – especially when the holiday falls on a Monday. When you have a Monday off, you get your normal weekend, and then you get an extra day to do all the things you didn’t fit in and don’t have time to do every weekend! I’m very happy we have Family Day in Ontario now – although this year, I realized that due some sort of federal and national exceptions, some of my friends did not have Monday off, which isn’t really fair...  

I spent my Family Day with both my family and some friends. I saw my friend Hilary, who I baked these Moroccan Cookies, or Ghribas, with. Hilary was in Morocco over Christmas, where she sampled a variety of pastries and came back with a Moroccan Pastries cookbook. As soon as she told me about her cookbook, I was eager to try out one of the recipes with her – and as you will see, we had to make a few modifications on the original recipe, but our cookies turned out quite well regardless! Ghribas are a Moroccan, macaroon like cookie that have a ground nut in it. We chose to make an almond ghriba.

Here is the original recipe as taken from the cookbook, Moroccan Pastries:

Chopped Almonds Ghribas (the original recipe):

500 g poached and peeled almonds

1 pinch gum Arabic powder

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon butter

3 eggs

250 g icing sugar

1 tablespoon grated lemon zest

Decoration:

egg white

200 g chopped almonds

Method:

Mix almonds and combine with gum Arabic powder, baking powder, butter, 2 egg yolks (preserve whites), 1 egg, icing sugar and grated lemon zest.

Shape little balls with almond paste; dip them into egg white then into a bowl of chopped almonds. Place them onto greased tray and bake in preheated and moderate oven. Bake for 20 minutes at 180 C.

And here's how they look in the cookbook...

Our version of the recipe:

(In addition to the modifications we made, we also tried our best to one-third the recipe – unfortunately, fractions were never my strongest math unit, so we may have also done a bit of rounding…)

165 g of almonds, blanched and peeled

1/3 tsp baking powder

1/3 tsp butter

2 eggs 

80 g icing sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

Decoration: 

egg white

chopped almonds

Our Method:

1. Hilary looked at a deli and Noah's for the gum Arabic powder, but neither carried it. So we made the executive decision to go ahead and bake the cookies without any gum Arabic powder. Gum Arabic powder is a binding agent or emulsifier - but luckily for us, our cookies managed to stick together without it! 

2. The original recipe calls for "poached almonds" - we weren't sure what this meant and a quick google search did not help us either, but then after some careful thought we decided this probably meant to blanch the almonds. To blanch almonds, boil water and drop the almonds in for one minute. Drain the almonds, and pinch the ends to easily remove the peel. 

3. Through reading the rest of "Moroccan Pastries" we came to realize that "mix almonds" in fact means puree/grind the almonds. We used a food processor to make an almond flour substance. Allow almonds to cool before blending in a food processor. Reserve some almonds for decoration, which should be chopped instead of blended.

Note: It's easiest to use a scale for this recipe - but if you don't have one, it's a 2:1 ratio for the almonds to the icing sugar

4. Combine the ground almonds, baking powder, butter, 1 egg and the yolk of the second egg, the icing sugar and vanilla extract in a bowl. Mix until combined. Reserve the egg white in a separate, small bowl.

Note: the dough was very sticky and a lot more wet than your average cookie dough - more like a cake batter. 

We used vanilla extract instead of lemon zest, because we didn't have a lemon to zest - but the vanilla compliments the almond flavour very nicely. 

5. To decorate, form dough into 1-inch balls, then dip in egg white and roll in reserved, chopped almonds.

6. Bake in 180 degrees Celsius, which to save you looking up the conversion, equals about 355 degrees Farenheit for about 12 minutes, or until edges of cookies are golden brown. 

These ghribas are surprisingly light and fluffy, while still remaining chewy. They reminded us of a macaroon – although a bit different in texture and taste. The almond flavour is very strong, but not in your typical almond extract kind of way - a delicious almond taste, as long as you like almonds. The cookies aren't too sweet either.

Almond Ghribas paired with Moroccan tea glasses

I hope everyone has enjoyed their four day work week!


Happy Eating!
- Caroline

Valentine's Day Cookies...

... Or, "Another excuse to make shortbread cookies and experiment with cookie decorating".

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY

(a day late... but better late than never right?)

Just another "fun-things-to-do-with-a-single-cookie-recipe" from your friends at scrambledeggsetc :)

Happy Eating!

Jo 

Mini Chocolate Cupcakes

I baked cupcakes for my friend Katie’s birthday, which was yesterday. As I carried the giant Tupperware full of cupcakes up the elevator to my friends’ apartment, the other person in the elevator asked me if the cupcakes were good. I laughed and said, “I hope so!” He then asked me if they were for a child’s birthday party – which I had to laugh at again. Why did the stranger in the elevator think these cupcakes were for a child? Maybe because of the bright coloured icing – combined with the fact that these are mini cupcakes, I’m sure.

Here are just some of the many advantages of mini cupcakes:

1. They look absolutely adorable.

2. You can eat them in a bite or two (remember when I went over why this is a good thing for a party when I made Mini Caprese Salad?) 

3. You’ll double the amount of cupcakes the recipe says it’s going to make – so great for sharing at a party where there will be lots of people.

4. Did I mention how cute they are? 

To make these Mini Chocolate Cupcakes, I used Martha Stewart’s recipe for Devil’s food cake and basic vanilla buttercream icing (I guess I’m going through a bit of a Martha Stewart phase right now – but she has great cupcake recipes!) I got to use my William Sonoma food paste set again that I bought for our Red Velvet Cupcakes for the icing – and I can’t get over how beautiful the colours turned out! 

The Recipes:

Devil’s Food Cupcakes

3/4 cup unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder

3/4 cup hot water

3 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 1/4 teaspoons coarse salt

1 1/2 cups unsalted butter

2 1/4 cups sugar

4 large eggs, room temperature

1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1 cup sour cream, room temperature

Combing the hot water with the cocoa

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line muffin tins with paper liners - or if you're using mini muffin trays and don't have mini muffin paper liners, grease well. Let me emphasize the well part. 

2. Boil water and allow to cool a little, and then whisk into cocoa until smooth.

3. In another bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt.

4. Melt butter with sugar in a saucepan over medium-low heat, stirring to combine. Remove from heat, and pour into a mixing bowl. With an electric mixer on medium-low speed, beat until mixture is cooled, 4 to 5 minutes. Add eggs, one at a time, beating until each is incorporated, scraping down sides of bowl as needed.

5. Add vanilla, then cocoa mixture, and beat until combined. Reduce speed to low. Add flour mixture in two batches, alternating with the sour cream, and beating until just combined after each.

6. Divide batter evenly among lined cups, filling each three-quarters full. Bake, rotating tins halfway through, until a cake tester inserted in centers comes out clean, about 12 minutes for mini cupcakes, or 20 minutes for standard sized cupcakes. Transfer tins to wire racks to cool 15 minutes; turn out cupcakes onto racks and let cool completely. Cupcakes can be stored overnight at room temperature, or frozen up to 2 months, in airtight containers.

7. To finish, use a small offset spatula to spread cupcakes with frosting. Makes about 32 regular sized cupcakes, or 64 mini cupcakes.

Vanilla Buttercream Frosting

                   

1/2 cup unsalted butter, room temperature

3 to 4 cups icing sugar

1/4 cup milk

1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream butter until smooth and creamy, 2 to 3 minutes.

2. With mixer on low speed, add 3 cups sugar, milk, and vanilla; mix until light and fluffy. If necessary, gradually add remaining 2 cups sugar to reach desired consistency.

3. If you want to create various shades of icing, divide into small bowls and leave some of the icing in the mixing bowl. This way you can always add more white icing to a colour you create if it turns out to be too dark. If you are using gel food paste, you will only need a tiny drop to create a vibrant colour – and then you can easily add more if you want your colour to be even darker or brighter.

Some notes about the cupcakes:

1. I was really excited to make mini cupcakes – but unfortunately, I didn’t have mini muffin cup paper liners. I greased the muffin trays, but they were still difficult to pop out of the trays once they were baked and I ruined a few in the process. I found that the ones that were smaller actually came out the easiest, so if you do decide to make mini cupcakes with no paper liners, I recommend really sticking to only filling the cups three-quarters full.

2. Martha calls for “coarse salt.” I suppose my sea salt is too coarse – because I thought maybe the salt would dissolve into the batter, but this was not the case. I wouldn’t say the salt ruined the cupcakes – but there definitely were a few bites where you would taste a salt crystal, which isn’t exactly what I was going for. So in future, I would not use the same coarse sea salt.

3. These cupcakes would be delicious with a chocolate frosting – something not too sweet. I went for buttercream because I wanted to dye the icing to look pretty, but if I was going purely for taste… chocolate frosting may have won out.

4. The other thing that can be a bit frustrating about mini cupcakes is that if you don’t have more than 2 mini muffin trays, you will have to do quite a few batches and wait while for the cupcakes to cool enough to remove from the trays before you can make your next batch and reuse the trays. I had 3 mini trays (thanks to my grandmother who lent me 2 of hers) – but it still required quite a bit of time to get them all through the oven! But it was so worth it for the cuteness factor! 

Mini cupcakes aren’t just for kids – they’re perfect for a birthday at any age! 

Birthday Girl with Mini Cupcakes!

Happy Birthday Katie! And Happy Eating to all! 

Caroline

Blueberry Buttermilk Scones

It’s always good to try things outside of your comfort zone, right? Or switch up your routine and challenge yourself? If you haven’t noticed, dear readers, I like to bake cookies and muffins, and make soup… I like to bake and cook other food too, of course, but if we’re talking about leaving my comfort zone, that brings us to scones.

I think scones have a bad rep in my mind because of a few bad ones I’ve had over the years. Sometimes scones can be too dry or flavourless. When I decided to take on the challenge of scones, therefore, I made sure to pick ones packed with flavour. Luckily, these scones also turned out to be soft and light, and not dry.

I’ve used Martha Stewart’s recipe for blueberry buttermilk scones but I made my own addition of lemon zest. I love the combination of lemon and blueberry – tart and sweet. I made mini scones, which are the perfect size to have with a cup of tea. If you don’t have a daily teatime scheduled in your life, now is definitely the time to start. I recently rediscovered George Orwell’s essay, “A Nice Cup of Tea” which I highly recommend reading. Orwell provides instructions on how to make the perfect cup of tea – and I agree with his point that tea should be drunk without sugar. 

As you may have guessed, dear readers, when you read about Red Velvet Cupcakes, it was recently my birthday. Jo gave me the perfect birthday present from my favourite store: Milk Bottle Measuring Cups  from Anthropologie. They stack to form an adorable milk bottle – and when you take them apart to use as measuring cups, each one is a different colour on the inside. I obviously had a lot of fun taking pictures with my new measuring cups while I made these scones!

The Recipe:

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 cup cake flour, (not self-rising)

3 tablespoons granulated sugar

2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

3/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup (4 ounces) cold unsalted butter, cut into small pieces

1 cup (1/2 pint) blueberries

1/2 cup low-fat buttermilk

1 large egg, plus 1 large egg lightly beaten for egg wash

1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Zest of one lemon

Fine sugar, for sprinkling

The texture of the flour and sugar, etc mixed with the butter

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Since I made mini scones and worried they may burn on the tops before baking through at the temperature the original recipe called for, I reduced my oven to 365 degrees.

2. Whisk together flours, granulated sugar, baking powder, and salt in a large bowl. Cut in butter with a pastry cutter, or rub in with your fingers, until mixture has the texture of coarse meal. It is important that you use cold butter rather than room temperature butter as this will help prevent the scones from spreading too much while baking. Stir in blueberries.

3. Whisk together buttermilk, 1 egg, the lemon zest, and the vanilla. Drizzle over flour mixture, and stir lightly with a fork until dough comes together but a small amount of flour remains in bowl.

4. Turn out dough onto a lightly floured work surface, and gently knead dough once or twice just to incorporate flour.

5. Create a 1-inch thick rectangle which should be about 12” x 6”. Cut into strips, and then cut each strip into small triangles.

Cut the dough into strips and then triangles

6. Transfer to parchment paper lined baking sheet. You definitely want to make sure you line your trays, because the blueberries will bleed a bit as they bake – and that wouldn’t be fun to clean off your tray after!

7. Brush scones with egg wash (the lightly beaten egg), and sprinkle with sanding sugar.

8. Bake until golden brown and cooked through, about 18-20 minutes. Transfer scones to wire racks to cool. Makes about 30 mini scones, or 12 regular sized scones.

Baking scones may not have been the most daring new endeavour I could have taken on – but I’m quite pleased with the results. And you will be too, I promise!

Happy Eating!

Caroline

The measuring cups stack to make a Milk Jug!

Leek and Butternut Squash Soup

January is (somehow) almost over – which means that by now, it wouldn’t be that surprising if one had maybe started break a New Year’s resolution. What? You think I may have broken mine? That’s hardly possible… I love soup! 

As I discussed when I made Chickpea and Tomato Soup, my New Year’s Resolution is to eat more homemade soup. I’ve definitely had lots of soup in the past few weeks – and yes, some of it has even been homemade!

I was skiing in Quebec at Mont Tremblant in the first week of January. After many winters of skiing in Quebec, I speak quite confidently when I say that food in Quebec is delicious. I know, dear readers, that you are probably dying for a recipe for the delicious cheese fondue I had while there, but instead I decided to post in theme with my New Year’s resolution.

At a lovely restaurant in the village of Mont Tremblant (i.e. not the Intrawest village but the real town), La Petite Cache, I tried the Leek and Butternut Squash soup. I have a very soft spot for Butternut Squash soup. It’s a fact that my grandmother makes the best Butternut Squash soup ever. Since unfortunately I have yet to receive that recipe from her, I decided to experiment with trying my own version of Leek and Butternut Squash. The soup at La Petit Cache was served garnished with diced pears, shaved parmesan, and greens – which was delicious, but I also found the flavours of the garnish over-powered the basic ingredients of the soup: the leek and the squash. For my version, I went with a much simpler garnish: a dollop of sour cream!

So, if you’re not heading to Mont Tremblant to try the soup at La Petit Cache, here is how you can make your own:

(And if you do decide to plan a trip to Mont Tremblant, take me with you!)

Butternut Squash - for some reason, I always think acorn (little,
green) squash are butternut - but these are the real deal!

The Recipe:

2 Tbsp olive oil


1 clove garlic, minced


3 stalks of leek

2 small butternut squash

2-3 small potatoes

6 cups vegetable stock

Black pepper


Sour cream, optional

1. Roast the butternut squash. Prick the squash with a fork on each side and place on a parchment paper lined baking sheet. Bake at 350 for 45 minutes to an hour. The squash will be ready when you can easily slide a fork into it.

2. Peel the potatoes and dice into small cubes. Partially cook the potatoes in a small pot of boiling water, so they are still firm.

3. Cut off the white ends of the leek and dice into small pieces. I know it seems like you’re only using a very small portion of the leek, since you’ll be discarding the long green stalks, but the white ends are the tender and flavourful part of the leek that is generally used in cooking.

4. Heat oil in a large pot or stockpot. Add the leeks and minced garlic and sauté for about 2-4 minutes, until the leeks are translucent but not brown.

5. Once the squash has baked, cut it open and remove the seeds. Peel and dice the squash into one-inch squares.

6. Add the potatoes into the leeks and sauté for about a minute. Next, add the squash and sauté for another minute.

7. Add the vegetable stock. If there is not enough liquid, add water (this will make the soup less thick in the long run).

8. Bring the soup to a boil and then reduce heat to medium and cook for at least half an hour. I let the soup cook for about 2 hours.

9. Allow soup to cool. Puree the soup in batches in a blender or food processor.

10. Serve with coarsely ground black pepper and sour cream if desired.

Diced potato, garlic and leek - lots of flavour!

The combination of leek and butternut squash may seem a bit surprising, but the leeks add a strong flavour that complements the squash well. It is important to roast the butternut squash first, as this brings out a lot more flavour than if you simply cut it up and cook it in the soup broth.

The seeds of the butternut squash are easy to scoop out once roasted and cooled

An important note that I learned about my “foolproof” plan of taking soup for lunch (as discussed in Chickpea and Tomato Soup). If the soup is frozen, it’s not really best to let it defrost in your lunch bag (or whatever you take your lunch to work or school in) until it’s time to eat – it will start to separate as it defrosts and can potentially spill… not that this may have happened to me… Next time, I think I’ll defrost the soup before I pack it – and make sure it’s in a well-sealed container…

Happy Soup Eating!

Caroline

Red Velvet Cupcakes

Dear Readers, let me ask you an important question: if it was your birthday, and you could have any type of cupcake, what would you choose? I think the answer here is pretty rhetorical… and if you were thinking something other than Red Velvet, maybe this post isn’t for you…

There are three things you need to know about Red Velvet cake:

1. It is tasty

2. It is pretty

3. It comes with Cream Cheese Icing (read: TASTY)

Could you ask for anything more in a cake?

When we at scrambledeggsetc had the brilliant idea of baking some Red Velvet cupcakes for Caroline's birthday we knew only the best would do. Enter: Martha Stewart.


THE RECIPE(s):


Red Velvet Cupcakes

2 1/2 cups cake flour (not self-rising), sifted

2 tablespoons unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder (we used regular cocoa powder and it worked fiiiine), silly Martha and her fancy pants cocoa. 

1 teaspoon salt

1 1/2 cups sugar

1 1/2 cups vegetable oil

2 large eggs at room temperature (question: is there REALLY a difference between a regular egg and a large egg? what about EXTRA large eggs? do they come from extra large chickens? do they actually make a difference in your cake???? if someone has the answers to these questions please enlighten us). 

1/2 teaspoon red food gel/paste*

1 teaspoon vanilla extract 

1 cup buttermilk

1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda

2 teaspoons white vinegar (Martha uses "distilled" vinegar, I don't know why, nor do I care). 

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line standard muffin tins with paper liners.

2. Sift cake flour, cocoa and salt together into a large bowl and whisk until incorporated.

3. In a separate bowl or stand mixer, whisk together sugar and oil until combined on medium-high speed. Add eggs, one at a time, beating until each is incorporated, scraping down sides of bowl as needed. Mix in food colour and vanilla.

*Martha, in all her baking glory, insists that you are better off using a red food gel or paste instead of your standard grocery store food coloring. [If you DO use regular food coloring you have to dump at least a whole bottle of it into your batter - thats a whole lot of stuff-i-don't-know-what-food-coloring-is-actually-made-of going into your cake. Meanwhile, you only need 1/2 a teaspoon of food gel). 

It's also a fantastic excuse to make a trip to William Sonoma! (Ohh what a shame). Caroline picked up a set of William Sonoma’s “Food Paste Set, Vivid Color” for $22, where she chatted with the sales associate about our plans to bake Red Velvet cupcakes. She told Caroline that this food paste was perfect for Red Velvet (or Blue Velvet) as well as icing for decorating cakes and cookies. Martha's insistence AND William Sonoma's approval? Needless to say we have definitely jumped on the food gel bandwagon. 

*ahem* now where were we?

Caroline demonstrates: the Fun Part!
Look at how much fun she is having...

4. Reduce speed to low. Add flour mixture in three batches, alternating with two additions of buttermilk, and whisking well after each.

5. And now the fun part: in a small bowl, stir together the baking soda and vinegar – and it will foam! (Just like grade 3 science class?)

6. Add mixture to the batter, and mix on medium speed for about 10 seconds.

7. Spoon batter into lined cups, filling each three-quarters full. We find an ice cream scoop works well for this.

8. Bake, rotating tins halfway through, until a cake tester (or toothpick if you don’t have a cake tester, like us) inserted in centers comes out clean, about 20 minutes.

9. Transfer tins to wire racks to cool completely before removing cupcakes. Cupcakes can be stored overnight at room temperature, or frozen up to 2 months, in airtight containers.

10. To finish, use a small offset spatula (or a knife or whatever you find easiest to work with) to spread cupcakes with cream cheese frosting.

Cream Cheese Frosting...

1 cup (8 ounces) unsalted butter, 

room temperature

12 ounces cream cheese, room temperature (a standard package of Philadelphia Cream Cheese is 8 ounces, so you’ll need one and a half packages)

4 cups icing sugar, sifted

3/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1. Beat butter and cream cheese with a mixer on medium-high speed until fluffy, 2 to 3 minutes.

2. Reduce speed to low. Add sugar, 1 cup at a time, and then vanilla; mix until smooth.

And now for some Red Velvet Cupcake "Words of Wisdom"...

Unlike cooking, where you can experiment with measurements and ingredients etc... baking is very precise. This is perhaps especially true for this recipe, which is slightly more complicated than your standard cake (with all the baking soda/vinegar-ness and what not). 

On a completely opposite note, we did find that the cupcakes were a little bit oily. Not taste-wise (they were delicious, as if you needed to know), but the bottoms of the cupcake tins and liners were a little wet - solution: add less oil next time! 

Remember to add the sugar to the oil and NOT to the other dry ingredients. Not that we made this mistake or anything... and had to start all over again... no, no, we scrambledeggsetc bloggers are PERFECT.

If your cocoa powder is a bit lumpy take a second to sift it. We didn't thinking it would be fine once we whisked everything together. Alas, we ended up with funny brown spots on our cupcakes (not that you could see them once they were frosted, and it didn't seem to change the taste... but still). 

Finally, remember that when you add the food gel to the mixture, it hasn't been mixed with the cocoa powder yet, and that the cocoa powder will alter the hue of the red. A.K.A if you can't seem to get that perfect, rich Red Velvet color wait until you've added the cocoa. You can always add more gel afterwards. 

Oh.. and if you are planning on taking some picture of your cupcake (and honestly, they are so absolutely gorgeous why wouldn't you?), make sure you come up with some artsy *cough*awesome*cough* display for them. A piano is totally a natural spot to find cupcakes right?...

Happy Baking :) 

Caroline and Jo