Valentine’s Day Cherry Vanilla Hi Hat Cupcakes

Ingredients:

• 2+1/2 cups flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 sticks (1 cup) butter
• 2 cups sugar
• 4 eggs
• 1 cup milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon cherry extract

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees F and place liners in two cupcake pans.
• Whisk flour, baking powder and salt together in a bowl and set aside.
• Beat butter until fluffy, about 3 minutes.
• Add sugar until combined.
• Add eggs one at a time.
• Beat in extracts.
• Add flour mixture and milk alternating a bit at a time.
• Place a ziplock bag in a large drinking glass by stuffing one corner down. into the bottom of the glass. Fold the opening over and fill with the batter.
• Squeeze excess air out of the bag, zip it closed and snip a hole in one corner of the bag.
• Twist the top part of the bag, squeeze and fill the cupcake liners 3/4 of the way.
• Bake for about 20 minutes or until a knife inserted in one of the cupcakes comes out clean.
• Remove from oven and cool completely.

• 1+1/2 cups water
• 1 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup meringue powder

• Bring water to boil in microwave or stove top.
• Pour in sugar stirring constantly until dissolved.
• Let cool.
• Add meringue powder and whip about 10 to 15 minutes until mixture is very stiff, like beaten egg whites.
• Load mixture into a disposable pastry bag or zip lock using method above and snip a hole in the corner.
• Pipe swirls onto the cupcakes and place finished cupcakes in the freezer for at least 4 hours.

• 1 bag of candy melts (I used a half a bag of red and one half bag of red)
• 1 tablespoon crisco
• Colored sanding sugar if you like. I used pink and red to match the candy melts.

• Place candy melts and crisco in a microwave. Microwave the candy melts 30 seconds at a time on high, stirring the mixture in between until it’s smooth.
• Pour mixture into a deep, wide heatproof glass or bowl.
• If you are using sanding sugar set a piece of parchment next to the bottle of sanding sugar. 
• Remove cupcakes from freezer. One at a time submerge the cupcake in the melted candy hold upside down over the mixture and let excess drip off.
• Hold the cupcake over the parchment and sprinkle the sanding sugar over the cupcake.
• Place finished hi hat cupcake in the fridge.
• When you are finished, fold the parchment paper in half and pour the excess sanding sugar back into the bottle.