patriOTTic cupcakes

I was trying to think ahead for a cute dessert I could make over the 4th of July.  I had an idea to make the cake part of a cupcake red, white and blue. While I realize there is big trend for cupcakes right now, I haven't quite gotten bitten by the cupcake bug (so to speak).  But I like I said, I wanted something festive, I had an idea, and I just so happened to have a family cookout this past weekend... so. I thought what better way to put my idea into action than to bake my 3 layer patriOTTic cupcake and see how it would turn out prior to the holiday.  I headed off to Wal-Mart and they had patriOTTic cupcake liners, and some red, white and blue sprinkles and red glitter frosting.  (This was going better than planned.)

I baked an average white cupcake recipe and was sure to use one that called for egg whites so I would get that crisp white cake color and not a more light yellow appearing cake.  I then separated my batter into thirds and added food coloring so one third was red and another third was blue, leaving the final third white.

Next I poured the batter into the cupcake liners with the blue first, followed by the white and then the red on top.  While I was doing this I was careful to smooth the batter flat across the entire circumference of the liner to ensure the lines in the cake would be clear and not run together.  (I was also careful not to mix the colored batter while I was doing this and tried to let it fall off my spoon as much as possible to prevent this from happening.

Surprisingly, just like I planned it, it worked out quite nicely with three layers of patriOTTic perfection.  As you saw in the first picture on this post I had lots of fun decorating the cupcakes with sprinkles and even drew flags and stars with the glitter gel.  This ended up being a great way to release some of my creative juices.  At the cookout people were surprised by what they found when they peeled back the liner to see the layers.  Definitely a festive dessert to make again on the 4th!!!