Sprinkles Galore: Birthday Cupcakes and Cookies

We’ve been shirking our posting duties for the past couple months, but now we’re back!  What better way to celebrate the return of Piggie Diaries than with SPRINKLES???

Sprinkles everywhere!

When I think of any celebrations, I automatically think of cookies, cakes, and ice cream – all with lots of sprinkles on top!   A few weeks ago, two of my friends were celebrating their birthdays, a perfect time for me to test out some funfetti (best word invented by Pillsbury) recipes I found.  I made two different funfetti recipes:

1) Homemade Funfetti Cupcakes with Mascarpone / Cream Cheese Frosting:  Yes – homemade!! I didn’t use the mix for these delicious morsels of goodness.  These were SO yummy I had to hold myself back from eating them all before taking them to my friend’s birthday dinner.  The recipe below uses only regular cream cheese for the frosting, but I had some mascarpone on hand and replaced half the cream cheese with it – an amazing swap, try it out!  The mascarpone makes the frosting slightly lighter and fluffier.

2) Funfetti Chocolate Chip Cookies: For these, I did use cake mix – I’ve never made cookies out of cake mix before so I was curious to see how these would come out.  In an effort to be healthy, I replaced ¼ cup of the butter with lowfat vanilla yogurt.  I liked the funfetti cake batter taste, but the texture of the cookies turned out cakeier than I would have liked.  It seems like everyone else didn’t mind though because it was only a matter of minutes before they were all gone! 

Homemade Funfetti Cupcakes

Recipe from LoventheOven

Prep Time: 20 min

Cook Time: 25 min

Yield: 16-18 cupcakes

Eat me

Ingredients

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

6 tablespoons melted butter

1 cup granulated sugar

2 XL egg whites

2 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 1/8 cup plain nonfat yogurt

a handful of rainbow sprinkles (jimmies), optional (I did a BIG handful of sprinkles)

Directions

1.  Preheat oven to 325°F. Line muffin tins with paper liners.

2.  Mix together in a bowl: flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt; set aside.

3.  In a large bowl, beat together melted butter and sugar until combined.  Add egg whites and beat until mixture is smooth and light.  Stir in vanilla extract. Add flour mixture in two additions, alternating with the yogurt.  Gently fold in sprinkles, if using.  Scoop batter into prepared tins.

4.  Bake for 25 minutes, until cupcakes are barely golden on top and a toothpick inserted in the center of a cupcake comes out with a couple of loose crumbs.  Remove from oven and let cool for 10 minutes in tins.  Remove to wire racks to cool completely.

Cream Cheese Frosting

About 1/3 cup and 3 T of softened butter

10 oz cream cheese (I used half marscapone cheese)

3 cups powdered sugar (I only used 1.5 cups max and it was plenty sweet, don't use 3!)

1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Directions

Beat butter and cream cheese together until well blended.  Mix in the vanilla.  Gradually incorporate the powdered sugar into the batter.  Beat until smooth.  Add more powdered sugar if necessary to get the desired consistency.

Funfetti Cookies

Recipe from LoventheOven

Prep Time: 1 hr 15 min

Cook Time: 12 – 15 min

Yield: 24 - 32 cookies

 yum

Ingredients

3/4 cup flour

1 1/4 cup funfetti cake mix

1/4 tsp. baking soda

3/4 cup softened butter

1 egg

1 egg yolk

2 tsp. vanilla

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 cup brown sugar

1 cup chocolate chips

Directions

1.  Cream together the butter and sugars. Mix in the egg yolk, egg, and vanilla until creamy.

2.  Add in the flour, cake mix, and baking soda.

3.  Stir in the chocolate chips.

4.  Refrigerate for at least an hour.

5.  Preheat oven to 350.

6.  Scoop heaping tablespoons of dough onto cookie sheets.

7.  Bake for 12-15 minutes, until the edges are golden.