Cake is actually the best part of a cupcake.

With all due respect to my dear co-blogger, frosting is most certainly not the best part of a cupcake. They don’t call it a frostingcake, do they? Or a cupfrosting? No! Cup. Cake. Clearly, cake wins.
 
And let me tell you, this cake wins everything. It’s all those cliche things people always say about cake: it’s moist! It’s rich! It’s delicious! It has a delicate crumb! [What does that even mean? I always hear it being used in conjunction with cakes. Maybe I'm too much of a plebeian to get it?]
 
But I digress. This cake is really good. The recipe is courtesy of the same lady that gave me the pound cake recipe. I’m pretty sure she’s a baking genius.
 

 
I have to admit, I didn’t follow the recipe exactly, but it was pretty damn close:
 
2 & ½ Cups of sifted flour
1 & ½ Cups of sugar
½ teaspoon of salt
1 teaspoon of baking soda
1 teaspoon of coco
1 cup of buttermilk
1 & 1/2cups of Oil or (Soft Butter)
1 teaspoon of vinegar
2 eggs
1 ounce of Red food coloring
1 teaspoon of vanilla flavor
 
Preheat oven to 350. Cream together sugar and oil or (butter). Add eggs, beat well. Sift together flour, salt, and soda (set aside). Mix together food coloring, vinegar, and coco. Add to sugar and oil mixture. Add vanilla. Add flour mixture alternately with the buttermilk. Blend well. Pour batter into two, well greased and floured pans, or spray with non-stick oil. Bake for 35 minutes. Cool.
 

 
I, of course, had to make cupcakes instead of cake. I always feel pressured when I make cake; that it has to rise perfectly, and there always seems to be so much of it. Cupcakes are way less pressure. Plus, they’re easier to carry to work, which is why I made them in the first place — it was my turn to bake for the department birthdays.
 
The only other change I made was to scale back a bit on the fat in the recipe. I used butter, but I only used two sticks [only! my husband was horrified and intrigued at having to take out two sticks of butter for me before I got home from work]. I also used slightly less sugar than listed, but didn’t cut back too much, since I wasn’t sure how that’d affect the taste. I feel like I could cut it by maybe a third of a cup and not have the taste affected too much.
 

 
See? I even spelled out “happy birthday” in little candy pieces. How precious am I? I also made one for the husband, because he looked all sad face at the thought of me bringing all the cupcakes to work. Yes, that is store bought frosting. Cream cheese frosting, which I’ve heard some people like on this cake and other people think is blasphemy. It works for me though, because I feel like it cuts some of the sweetness of the cake.
 
But seriously people, do yourself a favor and make this cake, in whatever form you want. Look at how beautiful it is!