yellow cake + chocolate frosting = my kryptonite

Do you have a food vice? A really serious one? One so bad that it could single-handedly bring you down if you let it? I'm talking the kind of thing you won't even think of buying because if you did, it would not make it to the pantry shelves but become wholly devoured within seconds of leaving the market. If they're lucky!

Insert me with a blurred face on A&E's Intervention: "Hi, my name is Anja, A-n-j-a, and I'm addicted to yellow cake with chocolate frosting."

I'm not kidding, the stuff truly is my kryptonite. In layer, bundt, cupcake, batter form...I don't discriminate. But it has to be yellow—not vanilla or white!—and it has to have chocolate frosting. 

If you make chocolate cupcakes, I'll eat them, sure. If you make vanilla ones, I'll pick and nibble. If you go the ungodly route and make yellow with chocolate, you're forcing me to eat 5-6 in one sitting. It's a problem.

My family knows what to make come birthday month. My old coworkers whipped one up for my baby shower. And if it's your birthday and I made one for you, you'll know that it wasn't really for you. You were just a pawn in my game of indulgence. Denial isn't just a river in Egypt.

And that's just what happened last week, when I made about 25 of these babies for a friend's birthday. Funny thing is, she got a tupperware container of about 8. Where did the rest go?

I'm not even going to add those numbers up. But case in point, people. This is why I don't buy or make it for myself. Restraint and discipline are two virtues that I don't ever see myself possessing. 

Cause what fun is that?  

Yellow Cake
Adapted from Smitten Kitchen 

Makes 20-25 cupcakes

4 cups cake flour (not self-rising)
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 sticks (1 cup) unsalted butter, room temperature
2 cups sugar
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
4 large eggs, room temperature
2 cups whole milk or buttermilk

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line cupcake tin with cupcake papers. 

2. Sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a medium bowl.

3. In a large mixing bowl, beat butter and sugar with an electric mixer at medium speed until pale and fluffy, then beat in vanilla. 

4. Add eggs, on at a time, scraping down the bowl after each addition. At low speed, add in milk until just combined. Add flour mixture in three batches, mixing until just incorporated. 

5. Pour into cupcake papers, filling each about 3/4 full. Bake for 12-15 minutes, or until light golden. 

*The frosting and sprinkles come from the Funfetti frosting can. Still in search of a homemade frosting that can match it. Working on it!

Comments

[Dinners & Dreams]

My daughter went crazy when she saw these cupcakes on the computer screen. I guess that means I should make them. They look fantastic!

[The Duo Dishes]

This works!

[Miel Abeille]

Your are an amazing photographer! I can't get over how mouth watering your pics look. Phenomenal job!

[Eva]

These are some lovely looking cupcakes. Really great photos!

[Cherine]

Those are mouthwatering!

[Memoria]

These cupcakes look amazing! Thank you for showing the inner texture of the cake. I have tried so many yellow cake recipes that yielded dry, cornbread-like cupcakes. These look just right.

QUESTION: How many eggs do we use? It is not mentioned in the list of ingredients. Thanks!

[Jessie Byrd]

Yummy! I have also been in search for the perfect chocolate frosting. I found one (though i never actually measure frosting ingredients out and always just add ingredients by taste)!!! You may want to check it out! It taste much like the store-bought chocolate frostings with a nice homemade taste. The cake part of this recipe got terrible reviews so don't let that make you hesitant on trying the frosting! yumm yum yuM!!!

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/food-network-kitchens/classic-yellow-cupcakes-with-milk-chocolate-frosting-recipe/index.html

[ImanF]

Looks amazing! But is it possible to use AP flour instead of the cake flour?

[Hanna]

These look so great! Yellow cake and chocolate frosting in my favorite combination as well, I'm going to have to try your yellow cake recipe next time I have a reason to make cake, because like you if I were to just make it on a whim I would eat near all of it myself! Not good!

[Pauline]

Haha, I totally relate to what you wrote about making 25 and then somehow ending up with about 8 to give away. That happens to me too, pretty much regardless of what I bake... Anything newly-baked is just too good to resist!

[jami]

These look great! Did you leave the eggs off the ingredient list?

[Katrina]

Everytime I see a cake that looks like just another chocolate cake, I sigh. Then it get cut into and there's a light shining forth from the yellow cakey goodness that is within. Apparently I like the same cake as you.

[Nika]

Hi i was just wondering how many does this recipe make? Thanks. nikabbylove@yahoo.com