There are those of you who will think less of me for this confession, I’m sure. Those of you who are judgmental and naive to the appeal will roll your eyes and suck your teeth. I’m not afraid. Go ahead, look down your noses at me if you must, but I am obsessed with the Twilight series. I attended a Twilight viewing party with my fellow Twi-hards to prepare for today’s New Moon premiere (Squeal!) and I brought these delicious, cherry-filled cupcakes with me! The recipe is after the jump. (Just for the record, I’m Team Edward.) — Katie D. Click for vampire cupcakes!

Just Bitten Cupcakes

Prep Time: 45 minutes
Cooking Time: 24 minutes
Makes: 18 cupcakes

Cake:
• 2 Cups Cake Flour
• 1 tsp. Baking Powder
• ½ tsp. Baking Soda
• ½ tsp. Salt
• 1 1/3 Cups Sugar
• ½ Cup Butter, room temperature, in 4 pieces
• 1 Large Egg Whites
• 1 Cup Buttermilk
• 1 tsp. Vanilla
• ¼ tsp. Almond Extract
• 1 Can Cherry Pie Filling

Marshmallow Frosting:
• 1 ½ Cups Sugar
• 2 Large Egg Whites
• 1/3 Cup of Water
• 2 tsp. Light Corn Syrup
• ¼ tsp. Cream of Tartar
• 1 tsp. Vanilla

HEAT oven to 350 degrees. Sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt into the bowl of an electric mixer. Add sugar; beat to blend. Drop butter into the bowl; blend on low speed until mixture looks sandy and no large chunks of butter remain (1 to 2 minutes).

BEAT eggs, buttermilk, vanilla, and almond extract in a bowl with a fork until combined. Pour 1 cup of the buttermilk mixture into the bowl with the mixer running on low. Turn speed up to medium; beat 1 ½ minutes. Reduce speed to low; pour in remaining buttermilk mixture. Beat until smooth (about 30 seconds).

Divide batter evenly among 18 paper-lined muffin tins. Bake until cupcakes are golden and a toothpick inserted into the centers comes out clean (16- 20 minutes). Cool on wire rack.

PUREE cherry pie filling in a food processor until fairly smooth. Cut a cone (1-inch across by 1-inch deep) out of the top of each cupcake. Trim off the pointed ends of the cones, leaving a disk. Spoon 1 tablespoon of cherry filling into each cupcake. Top with the disk of the cake.

For frosting, whisk sugar, egg whites, water, corn syrup, and cream of tartar in large metal bowl. Set bowl over a saucepan of barely simmering water (but not touching the water). Beat of medium speed until mixture gets fluffy (5-7 minutes). Increase mixer speed to high; beat until mixture is smooth and thick (about 3 minutes). Remove bowl from heat. Add vanilla; beat until cool (5-7 minutes).

FROST cupcakes. Dip a toothpick into leftover cherry pie filling; poke two fang holes in the frosting on one side of the cupcake. Dribble a little extra filling from the holes.

This entry was posted on Friday, November 20th, 2009 at 6:04 am and is filed under cooking, entertaining, holidays. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.