etc.

Recipe notes

• butter: all three recipes call for unsalted butter. I only ever buy salted butter, so I used that and it worked out just fine.
• chocolate chips: the frosting recipe calls for unsweetened chocolate. I had semisweet on hand and used that instead. It, too, worked out fine.
• food colouring: I divided the vanilla frosting into two batches and added two drops of red colouring to one batch, and two of green to the other.
• prep: I baked the cupcakes last night and frosted them this morning. No adverse repercussions to report. I made the chocolate frosting last night and refrigerated it overnight, so it was quite hard when I took it out this morning. I used the double-boiler method to soften it up for spreading (didn’t actually boil it, just put the bowl of frosting in a larger bowl of hot water).
• vanilla: I almost always use way more vanilla than what is called for. Did so again with these recipes and I think they turned out better for it (most recipes do). We have a litre bottle of pure vanilla extract that we bought in Mexico 5 years ago and I usually splash the stuff generously into most baking recipes. We only have about a quarter of the bottle left, so a trip to Mexico will have to be planned within the next 2 years. For purely culinary purposes, you understand.