A Traditional Farm Life - Yellow Butter Cake (Cupcakes)

A Traditional Farm Life

By Shasta Hamilton

Greetings from Enterprise, dear friends!   We’ve been enjoying unseasonably cool weather for August in Kansas this week.  Anything under 100 degrees this time of year definitely makes us count our blessings.

We are also counting cupcakes these days.  I’ll be helping my oldest daughter this week and next with an order for 20 DOZEN cupcakes.  You read it right, 240 homemade cupcakes for some wonderful folks we met through our restaurant.  Our friends are celebrating the 40^th anniversary of their farm, and decided the portable nature of cupcakes was just the thing for their big upcoming celebration.

Never ones to take the easy way out, we’ll be making all of these cupcakes from scratch, 4 dozen at a time.  We’ll cool them and freeze them, frosting them when party time approaches.

Why not use a mix? 

Have you ever tasted a homemade cupcake?  It’s a little more trouble while standing at the mixer, but what comes from the bowl sure beats what comes from a box—if everything goes right.  If it doesn’t, well . . .

We enjoy the convenience of boxed cake mixes from time to time, and their foolproof nature speaks volumes, particularly for the beginning baker.

However, if you’re ready to take a few extra minutes with some simple ingredients you probably already have on hand, prepare yourself for something extraordinary.

A word of caution, however, friends.  Following each step of the recipe is critical to achieving a light cake with an even crumb.  Needless to say, I’m speaking here directly from humbling experience.

When baking the “cupcake trials” of this recipe here in The Buggy Stop Test Kitchen last week, we made the same Yellow Butter Cake recipe two different ways.  First, we followed the directions to the letter, creaming the butter and sugar, adding eggs one at a time, etc.  After getting the first batch in the oven, we mixed up the second recipe commercial cake-mix style, adding all the ingredients to the mixing bowl at one time and beating for 2 minutes.

Alas, instead of triumphantly introducing an easier foolproof method, I became the fool instead.

My cake-mix version was a distant second in taste, texture and crumb.  While the taste was somewhat similar, the texture was very dense which caused it to taste “doughy” and underdone.  My cake-mix version also had an unusual dome in the center while the traditionally made cake was flat—perfect for icing a two-layer cake.

A homemade yellow butter cake will never have the same feather light, spongy “Twinkie” texture a commercially prepared yellow cake mix can give you.  It’s completely different.  Expect something more substantial, more like pound cake (a close cousin of butter cake, by the way).

The final thing we’ve learned in the Test Kitchen is to not over bake your homemade cake. Our greatest difficulty so far has been finding that “sweet spot” when the cupcakes are done—but not too done.

Just as with a commercial mix, the top of the cake should be dry to the touch and spring back when lightly touched.  A toothpick inserted near the center should come out clean.  Cool completely before frosting, preferably with homemade buttercream frosting.  Be sure to serve at room temperature, as refrigeration hardens all that yummy butter in the cake and changes the cake into a butter cake brick.  (Don’t ask me how I know.)

Hope all this detail didn’t scare you out of the kitchen into the baking aisle at your local supermarket.  Before you grab Betty’s box off the shelf, at least read through the following recipe.  Don’t underestimate yourself--you can do it!

Yellow Butter Cake (Cupcakes)

1 cup (2 sticks) butter,

room temperature

2 cups sugar

4 eggs, room temperature

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1 teaspoon almond extract

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

3 cups (12.75 oz.) all-purpose flour

1 cup milk

1.  Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Place 24 cupcake liners in muffin/cupcake pans.

2.  Place butter and sugar in large mixer bowl.  Beat until color lightens and mixture looks fluffy--about 5 minutes, scraping down sides occasionally.

3. Add eggs, one a time, beating well after each addition.

4.  Beat in extracts, baking powder, and salt.

5.  Add flour and milk alternately in three parts:  1 cup flour, 1/2 cup milk, 1 cup flour, 1/2 cup milk, 1 cup flour.  As soon as the last bit of flour is incorporated, stop mixing.

6.  Fill cupcake liners 2/3 full. Bake 22-25 minutes, or until top springs back when lightly touched and toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.  Cool in pans 10 minutes.  Remove to wire racks to finish cooling.  Frost with buttercream icing.  Yield:  24 cupcakes.

Copyright © 2015 by Shasta Hamilton

Shasta is a fifth generation rural Kansan now residing in Enterprise, Kansas.  She and her husband own and operate The Buggy Stop Home-Style Kitchen with their six home-schooled children.  You can reach The Buggy Stop by calling (785) 200-6385 or visit them on the web at www.thebuggystoprestaurant.com.