The year is just about at its end. What better way to celebrate than with cupcakes?
I have dabbled in the world of alcoholic cupcakes before with Chocolate Guinness Cupcakes, but New Year's Eve always has a champagne toast. Champagne cuppies it is!
I spent four dollars on some champagne, so it wasn't that great and I therefore opted not to put any in the frosting. However, if you get some good spumanti or asti, feel free to replace the vanilla in a frosting with champagne.
The following cupcake recipe just uses a cup of champagne and will have a hint of champagne flavor. It's also a light cake with the egg whites folded in at the end so that it stays fluffy.
Champagne Cupcakes - Makes approximately 4 dozen mini-cupcakes
- 2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
- 3 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp Kosher salt
- 2/3 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
- 1 1/2 cups white sugar
- 1 cup champagne
- 6 egg whites
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line mini-cupcake tin with paper liners.
- Cream the butter for 2 minutes on medium-high speed with an electric mixer until pale and fluffy.
- Add the sugar to the butter and beat together until fully incorporated and smooth on medium speed.
- In a separate small bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, and salt with a whisk.
- Add the dry mixture to the butter and sugar mixture, alternating with the champagne until fully incorporated. The batter will be sort of sticky.
- In a separate smaller bowl, beat the egg whites on high speed until stiff peaks form.
- Fold the egg whites into the rest of the batter.
- Fill the paper liners 2/3 full and bake for 11-13 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cupcake comes out clean.
I just used a regular vanilla frosting recipe and a 1M tip to make the little swirl. I rolled out some fondant that I purchased at Michael's and used some Wilton ready-made cake decals that said "celebrate," "cheers," and had the decorative swirls to make little edible placards for the cupcakes.
Have a safe new year!