EZ Colorful Cupcake Topping

Bake your favorite cupcakes, then top with icing and colored sugars, rainbow jimmies, or nonpareils, or a combination. "Gluing" colored sugars onto glaze-topped cupcakes results in festive-looking snacks that have less topping than those with swirly, buttercream mounds of frosting.

The pixstrip shows the following image areas:

1. Cupcakes, topping ingredients, implements
2. Glaze items
   1. Ingredients and implements
   2. Vanilla poured into pan with water in it
   3. Powdered sugar mixed into pan (3 successive images)
3. Glazing and sugaring process
   1. Applying glaze to cupcake (I applied glaze with spoon instead of dipping cupcake top because of the cake crumbliness.)
   2. Moving color sugar-coated cupcake to rack
   3. Placing done cupcake onto pan
4. Topped cupcakes on plate

Implements (for Topping the Cupcakes)

• Cup for powdered sugar
• Measuring spoons
• Small, shallow pan for mixing the glaze
• Fork for mixing glaze ingredients
• Shallow bowls or saucers for colored sugars (I used 6" paper plates that I folded for pouring sugars back into their jars.)
• Pan or rack for cupcakes
• Spoon for distributing glaze on cupcakes if necessary (Fetched when the dip-cupcake-into-glaze attempt worked poorly.)

Ingredients

• Cupcakes
  12 baked cupcakes (I used half recipe of yellow cake mix and blended in 3 tablespoons of rainbow jimmies.
• Glaze ingredients (I used 1/2 recipe for simple powdered sugar glaze.)
  • 1 C powdered sugar
  • 1 1/2 tbsp water
  • 1/4 tsp vanilla
• Colorful sugars (suggestions as follows)
  • Colored sugars
  • Rainbow jimmies
  • Nonpareils (I skipped.)
  • Other

Note: The amount of glaze is for 12 cupcakes (a half-box recipe for standard cake mix powder, which contains approximately 15 or 16ish ounces.) Double the amount of glaze ingredients if you plan to decorate 24 cupcakes.

Instructions

• Bake or obtain a dozen cupcakes. (Suggestion: For more colorfulness, fold in 3 tablespoons of rainbow jimmies into the batter.) After baking, remove the cupcakes onto a cooling rack.
• Make the glaze. (I used a fork to stir the water and 1vanilla into a shallow pan, then stirred in the powdered sugar.)
• Dip tops of cupcakes onto the glaze, lightly dip them onto sugars, and set them rightside up onto the rack.

Post-recipe Thoughts
I will never, ever again use the Duncan Hines Classic Butter Golden cake mix. With my first half-box batch, I filled 12 oil-sprayed cupcake wells as I normally do. The baked cakes had encroached the top of the pan, resulting in "muffintop" looks. They were difficult to extract from the pan. Many partially crumbled.

With the second half-box batch, I sprayed oil more generously, and poured the batter over 16 wells. After baking, the cakes looked like they hardly rose. Moreover, they were also difficult to extract. The prominent fail part was trying to hold a cake in preparation to dipping it into the glaze. It was as fragile as a cornbread muffin, making it necessary to improvise and smear the glaze. In any case, the results were pretty ugly.

FWIW, the recipe calls for soft butter instead of oil, and less than half of the usual amount of water. The beating instructions required 30 seconds for initial blending, like "normal" cake instructions. However, it required 4 minutes of medium beating instead of the "normal" 2 minutes on high. The batter was very thick, and messy to distribute.

Visit my YouTube video to see more details of this recipe's process.

Related Articles

• Icing (glaze): Those Two-Tone Confetti Cupcakes
• Additional colorful sweets: A Convenient Cake Mix Cooky Batch--Easter

Simply Simple Pineapple Cupcakes

How about pineapple cake that isn't upside-down cake or coconut-pineapple combo (piña colada-ish)? This recipe uses a standard recipe for yellow cake mix and crushed pineapple. Pineapple juice replaces the water. If you want to try an easy scratch recipe, visit "EZ Pineapple Cupcakes".

My cake recipes are usually for cupcake or mini-cupcake/muffin serving sizes; portions and handling are convenient for groups of people. They also take a lot less time to bake than sheet or round pan cakes. I can't work up enthusiasm for making a pineapple upside-down cake—too much mess and hassle for me, I guess.

I originally planned to try the bundt cake recipe that called for adding pudding, which I referred to in my "EZ Pineapple Cupcakes". This Dole recipe made my eyes glaze over, especially the need for 4 eggs and 3/4 cup of oil.

Fortunately, I spotted a related but more intriguing recipe. Although I want to bake a pina colada-type cake, I'm glad I read enough of the recipe to spot the part about replacing water with pineapple juice.

My pixstrip shows the following image sections:

1. Initial preparing
   1. Implements
   2. Ingredients
   3. 20-oz can of pineapple (measured for juice and divided fruit). Note: I squeezed the fruit a LOT to obtain the 1 cup of juice I needed.
2. Mixing
   1. Bowl with eggs, cooking oil, pineapple juice ("wet" ingredients)
   2. Lightly blended "wet" ingredients
   3. Cake mix powder poured onto the blended "wet" ingredients
   4. Mixed
   5. Pineapple poured onto the mixture
   6. Mixed
3. Baking
   1. Batter in pans
   2. Baked cupcakes
   3. Cupcakes turned over onto cooling racks
   4. Cupcakes in tins (8 cut into halves and in checkerboard placement with the other 16)

Implements

• mixer
• medium-large mixing bowl
• rubber spatula(s)
• measuring spoon
• measuring cup(s)
• spoon and bowls for divided pineapple, measuring cup or jar for juice
• cupcake pans (Use different size pans if desired, following baking time suggestions on the cake mix box.)
• cooling rack for baked cupcakes

Ingredients

• 1 box (16.5 oz) yellow cake mix (I used Duncan Hines Classic Yellow cake mix.)
• half of well-drained crushed pineapple (6 to 6 1/2 ounces)
• eggs, number as listed on cake mix box (3)
• cooking oil, amount as listed on cake mix box (1/3 C)
• pineapple juice as replacement for the water called for on cake mix box (1 C)
• spray oil

Instructions (Have the cake mix box handy!)

1. Preheat the oven (350°).
2. Prepare baking pans with spray oil. (The box says to use baking cups for cupcakes, but I didn't.)
3. Lightly blend the eggs, juice, and oil.
4. Pour the cake mix powder into the bowl of liquids and beat as directed.
5. Pour the crushed pineapple into the batter and blend.
6. Distribute the batter into the baking pans. (Cupcake wells will be almost full.)
7. Bake for time recommended (18-21 min for cupcakes). Test for doneness with toothpick.
8. Remove the pans of baked cupcakes and place on cooling racks (~15 min).
9. Place cakes upside down onto the racks. You might need to use a knife to loosen cakes from wells.
10. When the cakes are totally cooled, you can serve them up (with or without frosting), or pack them up.

The recipe yielded 24 whole cupcakes. I cut 8 in half, then arranged all of them in checkerboard pattern. People can pick half size, full size, or combination cupcakes.
Post-Recipe Thoughts

 White Cake Mix Instead of Yellow Cake Mix
The day after I made the cupcakes with yellow cake, I tried the same recipe with Duncan Hines Classic White cake mix. I used the other half of the crushed pineapple and added 1 cup of canned pineapple juice. I also added 8 drops of yellow food coloring before I folded in the pineapple, but the outcome was still paler than using yellow cake mix. Interestingly, the white cake mix calls for 1/4 cup of oil instead of 1/3 cup for the yellow cake mix. The calorie amounts reflect the difference in oil amount.

The table contrasts calorie amounts for yellow vs. white Duncan Hines cake mixes that I used.

Ingredients	yellow	white
prepared mix	2750	2400
pineapple	93	93
juice	130	130
total	2983	2623
each cupcake (1/24 cake)	~125	~110

 EZ Pineapple Cupcakes vs. Using Boxed Cake Mix
The process for the scratch vs. cake mix pineapple cupcakes mainly differs for mixing methods. Scratch requires gentler batter combining, and cake mix requires more vigor. The scratch results were moister than using cake mix. The calories for scratch is 125 (assuming 2 cups of sugar), same as for yellow cake mix. I skipped frosting the cake mix cupcakes to minimize calories and extra effort. I had also passed on adding extract.

Confetti Cupcake Bites

My recipe makes half-size cupcakes, using nonpareils and jimmies in two half batches during one baking session. Contrast the results of the sprinkle types, and decide on your own single or duo sprinkle-type morsels. I've been dancing around using both kinds of sprinkles for cake mix cookies in a couple of previous recipe articles. This time, I'm talking about using cake mix for actual cake.

In case you're unfamiliar with differences between nonpareils and jimmies, "Sprinkles, Demystified: An Explanation of All Types" explains a main difference as shape—round for nonpareils and cylindrical for jimmies.

Round Sprinkles: These can more specifically be referred to as nonpareils. These are those teeny-tiny round balls that can come in a single color or in rainbow.

Cylinder Sprinkles: Sprinkles with a cylinder shape are made by mixing up a paste ...a little slower to “bleed” color than the nonpareil type of sprinkle. ....In some parts of the United States, particularly Pennsylvania and the Northeast, this type of sprinkle (the chocolate type in particular, it seems) are referred to as “Jimmies”.

Caution: Nonpareils "bleed" rather readily in moisture, even more so with cake batter than with cooky dough as in my "Rainbow Nonpareil Cake Mix Cookies" recipe. Thus, minimize time and effort when stirring nonpareils into batter.

My pixstrip shows the following image areas:

1. Implements
2. Ingredients
3. Mixed cake mix batter
4. Batter divided into two Pyrex bowls—with nonpareils in the left bowl and jimmies in the right bowl
5. Each batter type in separate cupcake pans
6. Baked cupcakes
7. Cut sample cupcakes for visual contrast
8. Some cupcake bites arranged in a tin

Implements

• Mixing bowl
• Electric mixer
• Cup for eggs
• Measuring cup(s) for dispensing batter
• Tablespoon measuring spoon for measuring sprinkles
• Spatula for scraping batter
• Same-size bowls if making separate batches of nonpareil and jimmies batter (If making only one kind of cupcake, skip using these two bowls.)
• Cupcake pans

Ingredients

• 1 box cake mix (I used Betty Crocker Golden Vanilla.)
• Eggs (as listed on box)
• Cooking oil (as listed on box)
• Water (as listed on box)
• Sprinkles as follows (option a, b, or c—pixtrip shows option "a".):
  1. 2 T nonpareils for 1/2 recipe, 4 T jimmies for the other 1/2 recipe
  2. 4 T nonpareils for a whole recipe
  3. 8 T jimmies for a whole recipe
• Spray oil

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 350°.
2. Spray pans with oil.
3. Follow box instructions for mixing powder, eggs, oil, and water together.
4. If making separate nonpareil and jimmies recipes, divide the cake batter equally into two bowls. (I used two Pyrex bowls and evened out the weights.) If making a batch with only one type of sprinkles, skip this step.
5. Add the sprinkles.
• When using nonpareils, measure and very lightly stir them into the batter to minimize color "bleed".
• When using jimmies, measure and stir them into the batter, but don't worry about color "bleed".
6. Scoop the batter into the pan wells, each about 3/4 full. (For more crunch in the nonpareil version, sprinkle an additional pinchful over each well after dispensing the batter.)
7. Bake for about 17-20 minutes. Test for doneness with a toothpick.
8. Remove the baked cupcakes. Tilt them in the wells or place them onto a cooling rack to cool.
9. Frost if desired. Beware of extra effort required and added calories in gilding the lily.

Post-Recipe Thoughts
Interestingly, the heat seemed to cause the jimmies to diffuse. That is, after baking, the jimmies looked wavy instead of retaining their rod shapes. But the jimmies morsels didn't bleed and change the cake color like the nonpareil morsels did.

When working with nonpareils, remember that they're itty bitty spheres. When I first opened the jar, I tilted it. Out came several orbs, rolling freely on the table, a challenge to easily stop their willy-nilly, runaway movements.

Cake mixes that already contain jimmies are available. When I made the jimmies version of cake mix cookies, using Betty Crocker's Party Rainbow Chip mix, I didn't think to sift it to measure the amount of jimmies. Maybe some day I'll break down and buy another box, remembering to check out the amount of jimmies before baking something.

Choco Cranberry Sauce Cake Mix Cupcakes

This simple recipe has three ingredients besides spray oil—a 14-oz can of jellied cranberry sauce, a box of chocolaty cake mix, and eggs. (Chocolate seems to go well with just about any red fruit.) For my cake mix, I sifted a boxful of white and chocolate flavors each, using half for these cupcakes and saving the other half for a different recipe. (Batter up for the next recipe article!)

I'd Googled high and low for cake and cooky recipes that use jellied cranberry sauce. All of them seemed to call for the lumpy-cranberry type sauce. I finally took a breath and decided to forge ahead with the can of sauce that greeted me every time for many …, uh, long time when I opened the cupboard. I revisited info about possible cake ingredients for substitutions, such as applesauce. The amount of applesauce and water volume called for was similar to the cranberry.

The jellied cranberry sauce was an unknown—jelly at room temperature. I decided to spoon it out into a small mixing bowl, break it up with a spoon, and microwave it in 30-second sessions, stirring between sessions. The warm sauce did not break up well until I pureed it with the mixer.

My pixstrip shows the following image areas:

1. Implements
2. Ingredients and spray oil
3. Combo pic:
   1. Cranberry sauce out of the can and into small bowl, then pureed
   2. Mixed eggs in medium bowl
   3. Mixture of eggs and pureed cranberry sauce in the medium bowl
   4. Cake mix powder in largest bowl
   5. Mixture of the ingredients in the largest bowl
4. Batter in the cupcake pans
5. Baked cupcakes in the pans
6. Cooled cupcakes on a cooling rack

Implements

• Mixing bowls
• Cup for eggs
• Measuring cup(s) for dispensing batter
• Spatula for scraping batter
• Spoon for initial breaking up cranberry sauce (not shown—forgot for preprep pic)
• Electric mixer
• Cupcake pans
• Cooling rack

Ingredients

• 3 eggs
• 1 box chocolatey cake mix (I used half fudgy chocolate and half white.)
• 1 14-oz can jellied cranberry sauce

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 350°.
2. Spray oil into the pan wells.
3. Beat the eggs and set aside.
4. Break up and microwave the cranberry sauce in 30-second sessions, the puree with mixer.
5. Pour the mixed eggs into the warm, pureed cranberry sauce and mix well.
6. Pour the egg-and-sauce mixture into the largest bowl that has the cake mix powder.
7. At low speed, mix all the ingredients for two minutes, scraping the batter down with the spatula. Mixture will become thick, like scratch-cake batter.
8. Scoop batter into the pan wells, each about 3/4 full.
9. Bake for about 17-20 minutes. Test for doneness with a toothpick.
10. Remove the baked cupcakes onto the cooling rack.
11. Frost if desired.

Post-Recipe Thoughts
As mentioned, the batter becomes very thick during mixing. In dispensing it, I was apprehensive about distributing the batter into the typical 24 cupcake wells. Well, the batter did not run over the sides during baking. Tasty and moist! (Hmm, color and bready texture made me think of sweetish pumpernickel). Calories amounted to about 105 each cupcake. If you frost as ready-to-spread frostings recommend, you'll add an extra 130 calories for each.

EZ Pineapple Cupcakes

I recently became intrigued at a poked pineapple cake recipe that I saw in a coupon ad. I found the online version, but only after I ran across a no-poke recipe that attracted me for its simplicity.

In the past, I've looked at pineapple upside-down cake recipes, and can't seem to muster the enthusiasm to make one. Holey moley! Both Betty Crocker and Duncan Hines have recipes that, to me, are mind-numbing for numbers of ingredients. As for maraschino cherries inside the pineapple rings, I'll save those ingredients for the ham that I picked up for Easter and still haven't baked yet. (Sell-by date has another 1 1/2 weeks.)

Back to the Dole recipe, I thought the number of ingredients and process looked way more complicated than what I wanted to try. Making a cake with pineapple in it interested me, along with making handy individual smaller sizes instead of using a bundt pan. It took a good while to find the "Pineapple Poke Bundt Cake" recipe on the web. Without Googling the exact title, I was unable to find the exact recipe. Even searching Dole's website didn't yield the recipe.

The upside in expending the effort to find the pineapple poke cake recipe was finding food.com's "Frosted Pineapple Cake". The cake part calls for only five ingredients—flour, sugar, eggs, crushed pineapple, and baking soda. As usual, when I see a recipe, I assess the ingredients and process. As the poke recipe included vanilla bean, I figured the scratch recipe might be ok with adding vanilla extract.

I further deviated from the scratch recipe as follows:

1. Measured the pineapple juice for curiosity's sake (3/4 cup, the same amount for the poke cake recipe).
2. Stirred the dry ingredients in a plastic measuring bowl.
3. Stirred the wet ingredients in a different measuring bowl. (Added 1 teaspoonful of vanilla. As the poke recipe calls for vanilla bean, good enough use vanilla extract in the scratch recipe.)
4. Stirred the wet ingredients into the plastic bowl.
5. Noted the batter measurement (5 cups).
6. Poured the batter into the 24 spray-oiled cupcake pan wells, baking at 350° for about 20 minutes instead of 9 x 13 pan for 40-45 minutes.
7. Skipped the frosting.

My pixstrip shows eight image areas:

1. Implements (Your preferences might vary.)
2. Ingredients
   • Dry, with plastic bowl
   • Wet, with glass bowl, and spray oil
3. Batter in plastic bowl
4. Batter in cupcake pans
5. Baked cupcakes on cooling rack
6. Baked cupcakes detached from pans and flipped onto cooling rack.
   Note: For extracting the cakes, I used a plastic knife to gently cut around the cakes and nudge at the bottoms.
7. Baked cupcakes in cake taker.

Ingredients

• Dry
• 2 C flour
• 2 C granulated sugar
• 2 tsp baking soda
• Wet
• 1 20-oz can crushed pineapple, all of it
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla
• spray oil (Next time, I might try also shaking some flour into pans after I spray oil and see if the cakes detach a little more easily.)

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 350°.
2. Pour the dry ingredients into the plastic bowl, using a wire whip. (I used a flat one.)
3. Mix the wet ingredients in the other bowl.
4. Pour the mixed wet ingredients into the plastic bowl and stir the ingredients until they're moistened.
5. Pour and evenly distribute the batter into the 24 spray-oiled cupcake wells. (I pushed my luck by pouring the batter to almost the top instead of the usual 2/3 to 3/4 full.)
6. Bake for about 18-20 minutes or until the cupcakes are lightly browned. (Use toothpick test for doneness if desired.)
7. Transfer the baked cupcakes onto cooling rack.

Post-Recipe Thoughts

The recipe makes more of a quick bread than typical cake mix cake. Thus, I used a wire whip to gently but thoroughly mix rather than use a hand mixer and beat the ingredients. The cupcakes' texture seemed denser than regular cupcakes—weighing about 2 ounces each, a little less airy than regular cake, only slightly chewier than a muffin, and not crumbly. The cakes were not crumbly. I put them into cupcake papers for neat handling.

The cupcakes are low fat and low sodium, but extremely high in carbs—lots of sugar, pineapple, and flour. Each is about 125 calories, way less than if you add frosting. Yummy taste and texture; seems like adding frosting would be loading even more sugar and also adding more work.

October 31, 2015 (update)
If you want to use a cake mix method for pineapple cupcakes, visit "Simply Simple Pineapple Cupcakes". An update to ingredients: In researching for that blog article, I saw a scratch-ingredients recipe where 1 1/2 cup of sugar is ok to use. Though 400 calorie savings per batch makes sounds impressive, it translates to only about saving 17 calories per cupcake.

Waits N Measures, Baking Pans N Papers

I'm big on baking. I bake frequently enough to know what I'm doing, but still need to consult with recipes online and in books for quantities, capacities, and baking times and temperatures. I use cake mixes frequently for cooky recipes. I fiddle around with modifying basic cake mix recipes. Sometimes I change up ingredients. Sometimes I use different pans than the recipes call for.

I've included a table for using different baking pan cavities—square mini-cupcakes, mini-cupcakes, regulation-size cupcakes, and mini-loaves. For measuring capacity, I pulled out the pans and poured amounts of water into a well of each pan. The table has wait (bake) times and measures. Dimensions, capacities, and baking times are approximate. (I did mention in Lemon Poppyseed Mini-cupcakes recipe that mini-cupcake baking time is about 25% less than for regular cupcakes.)

Shape	Dims (")	Capacity	Wells /Pan	#min@ 325-375°
square silicone	1 1/2 x 1 1/2 x 5/8 dp	1 1/3 T (4 tsp)	24	15-16
mini- cupcake	1 3/4 U dia x 1 1/4 L dia x 5/8 dp	Less than 2 T	12	13-17
whoopie	3 dia x 1/2 dp	4T	12	15-16
standard cupcake	2 3/4 U dia x 2 L dia x 1 1/16 dp	5T	12	15 to 20, 22 to 27
mini-loaf	3 5/8 x 2 3/8 x 1 1/8 dp	8 T (1/2 C)	9	TBD
3 teaspoons (t) per tablespoon (T), 16 T per cup (C), 77 fluid drops per teaspoon

Caution: Recipes say to fill the wells about 2/3 to 3/4 full. Remember to differentiate advised-fill from capacity. If you fill the wells to capacity, the batter will expand during baking and spill over, making a BIG mess!

Actually, I still need to test for wait time for mini-loaves. I bought that pan several years ago, but I have yet to try using it. Visit Cake Mix Doctor and Duncan Hines topic links.

I recently acquired a couple of whoopie pans. I used one of them and one of my silicone pans for experimenting with a muffin recipe that calls for cake mix. The cake mix powder itself was a modification—half Red Velvet (Duncan Hines) and half strawberry (coincidentally, but not significantly, Pillsbury). More on the recipe in an upcoming article.

If using a cake mix powder, the box usually seems to specify baking times for 2 round layers, regular cupcakes (24), and a 9 x 13 sheet. In my experience, the mini-cupcakes yield tends to be about 2 1/2 as many—60. My Lemon Lemon Poppyseed Mini-cupcakes recipe yielded 77 units. (I'm positive that adding 2 T poppyseeds didn't contribute to raising the yield past 60.) In trying out the square mini-cupcakes, the yield would have been 24. More on that Red Velvet and strawberry cupcake experiment in an upcoming article.

For those who bake, the table is handy for planning the number of small-size baked items (assuming using an 18 1/4 oz. box of cake mix), the amount of batter to pour in, and how long to bake them. I am disappointed to say that, out of the three national brands of cake mix, only Duncan Hines mix has 18 1/4 ounces of powder for the normal 2-layer or 9 x 13 sheet cakes. The other two brands contain 15 1/4 ounces.

In my Internet travels, cupcakes and muffins, particularly small ones, cause confusion because of their similarities. Cupcakes are small cakes. You beat the batter. The cupcakes tend to have frosting. Muffins are quick breads, and the batter is best stirred gently. Muffins tend to have crumbs or icing drizzle. "Cupcakes Vs. Muffins: An Epic Battle and Some Big Questions" is an extensive article about their differences.

Standard paper liners seem to be mini-cupcake or standard cupcake sizes. Want to be cost-effective? For starters, don't pay extra for fancy colors or designs. The list has some quantities and prices to consider. (If the price was $[something].99), I rounded it up.

• Michael’s (undiscounted—40% coupon available online)
• 100 sm/$2 (~2 cents each)
• 350 sm/$4 (~1 cent each)
• 75 standard/$2 (~3 cents each)
• 18 short crown 2 ½ dia/$2 (~ 5.5 cents each) Yow!
• Make It Sweet (in Austin)
• 100 sm/$2 (~2 cents each)
• 500 sm/$6 (~1.2 cents each)
• 75 standard/$2 (~3 cents each)
• 500 standard/$9 (~ 1.8 cents each)

Looking for an alternative to short crown papers? Get large muffin papers and trim to size. Watch Todd Wilbur obtain shorter paper liners (at about the 1:41 mark) for making his peanut butter cup clones. Sure, he uses standard cupcake liners, but you get the idea.

Another Todd Wilbur video shows how avoid buying a Twinkie-shape pans for his Twinkie clone recipe by wrapping aluminum foil pieces around a spice jar. Move your pointer to about the :56 mark.

Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Mini-muffins

This snack is a hybrid of chocolate chip cookies and muffins—a long-time favorite cooky, but softer, and in a smaller, bite-size shape. The cooks.com recipe that I derived my recipe from does not provide the size of muffin pans to use or the expected yield. Fortunately, I have enough experience in baking to infer some unstated information.

• The amount of fluid and flour (+ oatmeal) looked to be enough to equal about one box of cake mix.
• The stated baking time of 22 minutes seemed appropriate for normal cupcake size.

Recipe deviations from the cooks.com recipe
I tend to deviate from recipes that I try out. For instance, I might substitute an ingredient that I have on hand. Deviations and disclosures follow.

• Granulated sugar instead of brown sugar
  (If you'd rather use brown sugar and find yours is brick-hard, you can use the info in my oatmeal cooky recipe for resoftening it.)
• Replacement of 1/8 of oil with sesame oil
  I had hoped to add a nutty flavor, but the nuttiness didn't seem apparent in the results.
• Regular-sized chocolate chips instead of mini-chips
• Mini-cupcake pans and paper liners, baking the batter for 17 minutes instead of 22
• Double-recipe batch, which yielded 72 mini-muffins.
  I made enough to tote to two events that coincidentally occurred on the same day—a workplace potluck lunch and an evening professional organization meeting.

My pixstrip shows five image areas:

1. Implements
2. Ingredients (dry, wet, and chocolate chips)
3. Batter in pans
4. Baked mini-muffins on cooling rack
5. Baked mini-muffins in goodies tin

Implements

• large mixing bowl
• medium small mixing bowl
• mini-cupcake pans
• mini-cupcake paper liners
• pastry blender
• measuring cups
• measuring spoons
• additional spoon for ladling batter if desired
• rubber spatula(s)
• cooling rack for done mini-muffins

Ingredients

• Dry
• 2 2/3 C flour
• 2 C uncooked oats
• 2/3 C granulated sugar
• 2 tbsp baking powder
• 1 tsp salt
• Wet
• 2 C milk
• 1/2 C oil
• 2 eggs
• 12 oz chocolate chips

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.
2. Place mini-cupcake paper liners into each mini-cupcake cavity.
3. Pour the dry ingredients into a large mixing bowl, using the pastry blender to blend well.
4. In the smaller bowl, mix the wet ingredients.
5. Pour the mixed wet ingredients into the larger bowl and stir the ingredients until they're moistened.
6. Stir the chocolate chips into the batter.
7. Scoop about a rounded spoonful of batter into each paper-lined well, about 2/3 to 3/4 full. (I filled two batches of 36 wells. YMMV.)
8. Bake for about 17 minutes or until the mini-muffins are lightly browned. (Use toothpick test for doneness if desired.)
9. Transfer the baked mini-muffins onto cooling rack.

Lemon Poppyseed Mini-cupcakes

My recipe calls for following the instructions for boxed lemon cake mix and adding two tablespoons of poppy seeds. Box mixes usually omit information about mini-cupcakes, which are about 1/3 the volume of regular cupcakes (2 1/2 x 1 1/4). The mini-cupcake size is 1 3/4 x 1. This article includes also includes mini-cupcake baking times, yields, and paper liner vs. oil vs. oil/flour methods.

Regular cupcake vs. mini-cupcake

Cake mix boxes usually indicate the yield to be 24 cupcakes. I have encountered recipes that hedge and claim 24 to 30 cupcakes. I have seen recipes claim that a box cake mix should yield 60 mini-cupcakes. My yield was 77, using the recommendation of slightly rounded tablespoon of batter for each pan well. Suggested baking times for regular cupcakes had a range of 15 to 20 minutes for the low end, and 22 to 27 minutes for the high end. If baking mini-cupcakes, use the regular cupcake baking time, but reduce it by maybe 25%. My batches came out fine at 13 to 14 minutes. As for oven temperature, from gleaning various recipes, 350° seems to be common.

Note: For a serving size between regular cupcake and mini-cupcake, cut each cupcake in half. Hypothetical yields per box cake mix batch can be 24 (regular cupcakes), 48 (regular cupcakes cut in half), and 60 (mini-cupcakes).

Paper liner vs. spray-on oil vs. oil/flour spray

In past experiences of using paper liners, it seemed like the paper did not cleanly separate from baked cupcakes without maybe 10% of the cake sticking to the paper. I don't know if the detachment problems were because of the cupcakes being regular size, or because of the cake mix formulation being from pre-pudding eras.

I was pleased that the paper peeled away from the mini-cupcake neatly. The method that yielded the least satisfying results was using spray oil with flour in it. The dispensing was not as easy as with using spray oil. The oil and flour spray method left a thin layer of baked cake inside the wells, and more than with using spray oil.

My pixstrip shows four sections:

1. Implements
2. Ingredients
3. Paper liners, oil spray, oil/flour spray
4. Baked mini-cupcakes

Implements

• mixer
• medium-large mixing bowl
• rubber spatula(s)
• measuring spoon
• measuring cup(s)
• mini-muffin pans (Use different size pans if desired, following baking time suggestions on the cake mix box.)
• cooling rack for done mini-cupcakes
• paper liners, spray oil, or spray oil/flour (Using paper liners yielded the best results for me.)
  Note: Greasing the bottoms of the wells is another batter lining method.

Batter ingredients

• 1 box lemon cake mix (~18 oz.)
• eggs, number as listed on cake mix box
• oil, amount as listed on cake mix box
• water, amount as listed on cake mix box
• 2 T poppy seeds

General instructions for all cake pan sizes (Have the cake mix box handy!)

1. Prepare the cake batter according to cake mix box instructions.
2. Fold in the poppy seeds.
3. Prepare baking pans by using paper liners, spray oil, or spray oil/flour.
4. Pour batter into the baking pan(s) of your choice.
5. Bake as recommended; however, if baking mini-muffins, reduce time by 25%. (Mine came out fine between 13 and 14 minutes.)
6. Test cake for doneness. If done, remove pan(s) from the oven.
7. Transfer cakes (or mini-muffins) onto cooling rack.

Calories and additional information

Total calories for the ingredients I used, the cake mix brand and flavor being the biggest variable, the calories totaled 2900, give or take a few. Dividing the number by my yield of 77 mini-cupcakes comes out to ~38 calories each. YMMV, depending on cake mix brand, egg sizes, and recipe that you use. Also, adding icing or frosting will increase the calories.

Note: The container of the poppy seeds that I bought recommended yellow cake mix and 1 tablespoon of lemon extract for another version of lemon poppyseed cake. I myself advocate minimal ingredients—lemon cake mix instead of yellow cake mix and lemon extract. If someone wants to try the alternate recipe, I would be interested in the contrast results.

Related: "Revisiting Lemon Poppyseed Mini-cupcakes" article | video