Traffic light cupcakes

A rare attempt of going back to baking again, considering I left all of my baking items in Australia and I'm pretty sure Claudia had helped herself to all of the items.
Major sigh about it. My electric hand mixer, my food coloring, my biscuit molds, baking tray, everything. Oh gosh why.

So it was time to get everything again, and keeping it in Singapore, a slow start, but for now I managed to get the baking tray first. Shall get the electric hand mixer next and more food coloring!
It was post-labor day blue and I'm in the kitchen thinking of what to bake. My original idea was to bake rainbow cupcakes, but apparently the whole of Singapore supermarket was against it that I couldn't find any blue coloring. Headed down to Nex in the afternoon, and both Fairprice and Cold Storage were out of stock. Bad luck much?

A change of plans and since I only three colors, let's do a traffic light cupcake instead.

Three bowls of my traffic light colors; green, yellow and red.
And it's time to pipe down into the baking tray.
The first time I did these layer cupcakes, it was pure torture. I was spooning carefully into each muffin holes and trying to even out the layers. Today I figured that I don't want to torture myself too much and decided to scoop the mixture into plastic bag, cut a hole at the bottom and just pipe them in. Much easier and fun method.
And after piping in, I would use the spoon to smooth out the layer before I add the next color layer.

And here are two special jars for my tasters.
Making two cupcakes in a jar for them to try, and if it's good, I shall make them in future as gifts to friends.
But in the meanwhile, with every baking session, there's always a need for tasters. Very important job.

Once the green is done, next is yellow.

So that's the overall color of the jars.
Had to place them in a water bath just in case they cracked on me while baking, and that is definitely not good at all.
Wasn't exactly sure how the outcome would be like since it's my first time baking in Singapore, and baking these cupcakes in a jar.
It's amazing mom haven't officially banned me from baking.

 
Impatient bakers waiting outside the oven for the cupcakes to rise.

And finally they're done!
The ones in the tray were baked way faster than the ones in the jars. Reckon that the jars had more quantity and also 'cause it was in a jar, heat might be harder to bake them and for the air to be released.
It was like an additional 10-15 minutes for them to bake.

The layers are out!

And well, with such pretty delicates, you just have to spam pictures.

The jars were finally ready to be taken out, and they were exploding!
Lesson learned, don't make the layers too high, best to fill it up to half of the jar's size would be right, 'cause in baking, they tend to rise and we don't want them to be over flowing either.

A spoon was used to scoop out the excess and that's when we get a taste of the baking.
Wasn't that sweet, especially when only half the amount of sugar was added in, but just of a good taste.

It's a freaking traffic light in a jar!

What's next once the cupcakes are cooled?
Frosting!
Threw the cupcakes (not literally) in the freezer while I prepare the frosting.
The cupcakes needed to be cooled down before any frosting can be added, else it would just melt on my cupcakes 'cause of the heat.

And that's all the final products after 3.5 hours of spending in the kitchen, from baking it to frosting it to decorating it.
Well spend afternoon I'll say.
Pat on the back for a good first attempt and until more baking session to come.
Till then, I'm making a list of what I want to bake, and spamming internet for good reliable, easy recipes to follow.