What Ever is Lovely: Valentines Cupcakes for the Teachers

So I LOVE to cook, and we have potlucks and school all the time....

But I NEVER bring anything...and I feel like a mooch.

So this time, for the "Heart and Soul Potluck" I was going to be ready.

I made the cupcakes ahead of time. I made the frosting ahead of time. I dragged the hubby to two different stores to find heart sprinkles (which I couldn't find) and had these big plans to make the cutest valentines day cupcakes EVER! They were going to look like the ones I found on pinterest. (Follow the next Jump)

And THEN they "postponed" the pot luck!!! WHAT?! I have close to 30 cupcakes ready for to be delivered TOMORROW for hungry teachers and the pot luck is canceled.

I'm bringing them anyway.

I followed this recipe by Bakerella. I was going to decorate them similarly but since the pot luck was canceled I wimped out on the arrows.

A couple changes I made:

I made my icing a little differently to the taste and texture that I like. I added whipped cream and some milk to the mixture once the butter, Cream cheese and Sugar were creamed. The interesting thing about the whipped cream is that it doesn't really water down your icing, but just makes the whole thing richer. I added the milk to water down the icing a bit when I put too much sugar in.

The grocery store was out of buttermilk (when does that happen EVER?!) so I made my own by taking the same amount of milk and adding a bit of lemon juice (or you can use vinegar) to it.

When I'm making cakes I prefer to use cake flour as opposed to all purpose flour. I just think it has a better texture.

I'm not sure why, but the cupcakes took about 10 minutes longer to cook than the reccomended 18 minutes.

I used Russel Stovers Itty Bitty Chocolates. (Russel Stover is my favorite midline chocolates. My FAVORITE chocolates are made by Christopher Elbow)

An then I used pink and read crystal sugar.

A trick to evenly control the sprinkle sugar is to place all of the cupcakes together and then hold the sugar container about a foot or two above them. Then I tap the sugar canister while I move the container over the cupcakes.