Cherry and Almond Cupcakes Recipe

I've wanted to make these cupcakes for about a week now but I had a tough time finding a recipe for cherry cupcakes that used maraschino cherries and wasn't chocolate. In the end I wound up adapting a vanilla cupcake recipe myself. They turned out incredible! These are might just be the best cupcakes I've ever made. They are incredibly moist and fluffy andthe different flavours are strong but not overpowering.

Recipe: Cherry Cupcakes with Almond Frosting

Ingredients

1 cup butter (room temperature)
2 cups sugar
4 eggs separated (room temperature)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon almond extract
3 cups all-purpose flour
4 tsp baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup milk
2/3 cup marashino cherry juice
1 10oz jar of marashino cherries, finely chopped

1/2 cup salted butter
1/2 cup shortening
1 lb bag of icing sugar
2 tsp almond extract
4 to 5 Tbsp cold milk

1/2 cup slivered almonds

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease or line muffin tins. Recipe makes about 3 dozen cupcakes.

In a large bowl, cream together first portion of butter and sugar with an electric mixer until light and fluffy (about 4 or 5 minutes). Add two egg yolks and mix for an additional minute. Add remaining egg yolks and mix for an additional minute. Add vanilla and almond extracts and mix in.

In a separate bowl, combine flour, baking powder and salt. In another bowl, combine milk and marashino cherry juice. Alternate between adding dry ingredients and liquid ingredients to the butter mixture, a little bit at a time.

Fold in chopped cherries.

In small bowl, beat egg whites on high until stiff peaks form. With a rubber spatula, add about 1/2 cup of the egg whites to the mixture and fold in gently, to separate and lighten the batter. Add remaining egg whites and fold in gently until no white streaks are present.

Fill cupcake tins half full and bake for 22 to 25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cupcakes comes out clean. Allow cupcakes to cool in the pan for ten minutes before removing to a wire wrack. Allow to cool completely before decorating.

For the frosting, mix remaining butter and the shortening in a medium bowl until light and fluffy (about three minutes). Add almond extract and mix until combined. Add icing sugar a little at a time, mixing until combined after each addition. Once all of the icing sugar has been mixed in, add milk 1 Tbsp at a time until icing has reached desired consistency.

In a dry frying pan, toast almond slices over medium heat until they become fragrant and turn light brown. Keep the almonds moving and flip frequently so that they don't burn.

Pipe a swirl of frosting on each cupcake using a Wilton 1M tip. Place three or four toasted almond slices on each.


Here's a picture of the inside so you can see the pretty pink colour. Somehow I managed to cut this one where there were no cherries, but in general, there were a lot of cherries in each cupcake. You may decide you want to add more though.