simply wonderful cupcakes

I love cupcakes. I really do. I do not love overly sweet, dry, over frosted cupcakes. It's a tragedy. I tried and tried (eating all those cupcakes, yes, it was difficult) to find the perfect balance of texture, taste, sweetness and frosting. I made lemon, banana, chocolate, vanilla and even s'mores cupcakes topped with a rainbow of frostings and toppings only to find that the cupcake nirvana was a simple yellow cake (made even better with a shiny chocolate ganache). It has plenty of flavor with just a healthy dose of vanilla but it's also quite nice with some fruit, citrus zest, or chopped chocolate stirred in. Whenever I bring these cupcakes to school there are very rarely leftovers and in my book that is very high praise.

Golden Layer Cake (from Williams Sanoma Sweet Treats)

*makes one huge 8 inch cake or about 2 dozen cupcakes

• 3 cups all purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2 sticks soft butter
• 2 cups sugar
• 4 room temperature eggs
• 1 cup buttermilk

Preheat the oven to 350F and grease you cupcake tins or cake pan very well or use cupcake papers

Sift the flour baking powder and salt and set aside

Using an electric mixer cream the butter until fluffy then add the sugar and mix until pale

Break the eggs into a small bowl and lightly beat

Beat on medium speed until combined

Alternate beating in 1/3 of the flour mixture with 1/3 of the buttermilk -the batter will be thick!

Fill the pans or tins (if you have a baking scoop use it to fill the cupcake tins

Bake 45 minutes for a cake or about 15-20 minutes for cupcakes

cool and frost with shiny chocolate ganache (recipe follows)

Shiny Chocolate Ganache

• 3/4 cup chopped chocolate (try semisweet to counter the sweetness of the cake)
• (at least) 3 tablespoons butter, chopped (you may need more to get the right consistency)
• 1 tablespoon mile (or cream if you feel like it)
• 1 tablespoon light corn syrup (this makes it nice and glossy, but you don't need it)

Combine in a small, heavy saucepan over low heat until the chocolate it about 80% melted. Take it off the heat and keep on stirring until completely melted then spread on cupcakes using an offset spatula.