Rosie’s Pinkalicious Cherry Cupcakes...

I recently stumbled upon this gorgeous website called http://www.frostingforthecause.com/. 

The Project 

Beginning January 1, 2011 a total of 365 sugar cookie & cupcake bakers/decorators and bloggers from across Canada and the United States will take turns doing a guest post here at Frosting for the Cause. Once a day, every day for a year you will be treated to a new and talented blogger who will showcase their home-made, hand-decorated cookies or cupcakes together with their recipes. Almost everyone, everywhere, has been touched by cancer in one form or another. The guest bakers will also share in a very personal manner with readers of Frosting for the Cause, about a woman in their life who had to face this terrible disease head-on.

The Goal

By signing onto this project every guest baker/blogger has committed to not only donating a batch of their cookies or cupcakes to their local Women’s Hospice but they have also committed to making a personal $25.00 donation to either the Canadian or American Cancer Society to be directed to research projects that are working diligently to find cures specifically for cancers that affect only women. If there is no Women’s Hospice in the area of the guest baker/blogger then the baker commits to donating their baked goods to their local hospital or Cancer Society office. Through the generous volunteer commitment of the 365 guest bakers on Frosting for the Cause, we will not only raise awareness of all of the cancers that currently affect women, but we will raise a total of $9,125 alone for research into these diseases.

You Can Help

Why stop there? Imagine if all of our readers donated a little bit, and then mentioned on their blogs about the goals of the Frosting for the Cause project. Imagine if they tweeted about it and then their readers and followers tweeted and everyone who read about this project decided to make a donation. A lot of money could be raised and a lot more research could be done. If you love to bake and decorate sugar cookies or cupcakes then you are encouraged to join in on this project. If you don’t bake but you are reading this now, why not pass on this blog link to a friend or two or more of yours and have them do the same. If you just want to make a donation a some point, then that would be wonderful and you can click on over to the Donation page whenever you are ready. Corporations and private bloggers alike can help as well by agreeing to sponsor this blog or advertise their corporate logos on this site with a link back to their corporate domain. Please see the Sponsor/Advertise page for more information. Thank you.

Together We Are ♥ Baking ♥ A Difference


While reading about this amazing cause...I was immediately WOWED by these beautiful Pink cupcakes!  Rosie from http://sweetapolita.com/blog/ submitted these gorgeous cupcakes in honor of a very special woman in her life...

What a wonderful cupcake for not only Breast Cancer Awareness...
but, for a yummy {and gorgeous} Valentines dessert to share with the special people in your life...!

Cherry Cupcakes

*Makes 2 dozen cupcakes

Ingredients:

1 cup unsalted butter, softened

4 eggs, separated

2 cups sugar

1 cup whole milk

¼ teaspoon almond extract

4 cups all-purpose flour

3 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

4 tablespoons maraschino cherry juice

1 cup maraschino cherry halves (optional, but I choose not to include)

Few drops red/pink gel food colouring (optional)

Method:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Cream the butter and sugar until very fluffy, about 5 minutes. Sift dry ingredients together and set aside. Set egg whites aside to be beaten. Add the egg yolks to the creamed mixture, one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Mix in extract. Add dry ingredients and milk, by alternating (beginning and ending with dry) until just combined. Fold in stiffly beaten egg whites, and the cherries/juice. For pinker cupcakes, add a few drops of pink gel food coloring to the batter.

Using ice cream/cookie scoop, fill white cupcake liners (if doing my decorated version, otherwise any liner of your choice) about 2/3 full. Bake until inserted toothpick comes just clean, about 18-20 minutes, but take care to not over-bake.

As soon as you have removed cupcakes from oven, carefully and cautiously (at the risk of stating the obvious, they’re super hot!) remove each of them from pan and place on wire rack.

Decorating the Pinkalicious Cherry Cupcakes

Now, in Rosie's version, she uses fondant and assorted tools to get her beautiful cupcakes to look like this...

But, I know that I personally:

a) Would screw this up

b) Do not have enough patience to do this

So... I would finish these fabulous cupcakes with some pink frosting...white sprinkles...a real cherry...& some pretty pretty paper cupcake holders...

Please take a minute to check out http://www.frostingforthecause.com/.
It is a wonderful idea...and I am a HUGE believer of changing the world...one person at a time...