Foodie Friday- Earl Grey Cupcakes

So, as some of you may have gathered, I recently had my wisdom teeth removed. All four of those stubborn suckers had to come out, and some additional fillings were the icing on the crappy dental procedure cake. It pretty much sucked, and I suffered some intense bruising on the lower sides of my face which remained like permanent little mutton chops for a couple weeks. I'd been following directions carefully, I was sure to not use a straw, I was taking all my medications on time, and eating soft foods and carefully rinsing after eating. When I went into the dentist to get my sutures removed on Wednesday, the dentist noted that I hadn't healed properly and was pretty severely infected. Blast!

The worst part of this all, in my opinion, was his suggestion (read: order) that I can only eat soft foods for another week, at least! I'm so sick of mashed potatoes and pudding I could cry. I miss caramel, steak, tortilla chips. Really anything solid that requires chewing- I LONG for it. But alas, I must follow the doctor's orders. I didn't really want to make a cupcake type recipe for Foodie Friday two weeks in a row, but cupcakes are one of my few soft food comforts. I can gum them down, but they aren't liquified or baby-food-esque in nature, and that gives me some relief from a steady diet of  mashed potatoes and pudding.

If you have any appetite at all after reading about my infected mouth, here's our recipe for today! Yay!

Ingredients

1 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
1 and 1/2 cup sugar
4 Eggs
1 cup Cake flour
1 and 3/4 cup All purpose flour
1 tsp Baking powder
1 tsp Baking soda
1 cup Milk
2 bags Earl grey tea
Some vanilla extract- anywhere from a few drops to a tablespoon. I love my vanilla, don't judge me!

Me, scooping out some cake flour... and hey! That's Mister LJ behind me :)

My lovely friend Alyssa came over for a picnic (more on that later) and was kind enough to help me with my cupcakes and do some photographing for me! She's super talented, be sure to check out her facebook page here! 

Before we start, preheat your oven to 350 to get it ready for your yummy little cupcakes.

Take your dry ingredients in a small bowl and whisk them together gently.

Cream your butter and sugar together until it looks fluffy- longer than I did for the picture above :)

Have a friend help you out, (or do it yourself, little miss dexterous!) and crack the eggs one by one while mixing. Blend those babies in nice and smooooove.

Add as much vanilla as your little taste buds prefer, and mix that in too.

Then, add your dry ingredients into your egg/sugar/butter mixture and pour in your milk and mix all that deliciousness into tasty, tasty, batter. Don't eat it, it's for cooking. Or, you know... just a spoonful. I won't tell ;)

Pour your batter into a greased or lined cupcake pan, filling each about 3/4 full.

Bake those babies for about 17 minutes at 350 F or until a toothpick inserted in the center of a cupcake comes out clean. 

Let them cool for a little bit and ice those yummy little cakes. Alyssa and I are obviously not professional cake decorators, but darn it all we sure as heck tried our hardest! Our cupcakes may look pathetic, but they tasted DELISH!

The recipe I used by Yi Reservation called for a chocolate whipped cream, which we made- but upon tasting it, it just wasn't satisfying my ridiculous sweet tooth. So we broke out a tub of store bought vanilla (I know, I know, but we were in a pinch!) and the vanilla worked perfectly with that delicious, subtle Earl Grey flavor.

Check out this adorable little cupcake edit Alyssa made for my blog! Isn't is presh? Love that girl, she's awesome sauce.

These were totally yummy, subtle and light little tea cakes and perfect to satisfy a bit of a sweet tooth. Definitely worth making! If you do try them out, let me know what your opinion is :)