Vegan Rosewater Cupcakes

These just sound pretty, so I knew I had to try this recipe (with a few variations) from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World for when I was hosting book club. Our book club consists of 7 different, but awesome ladies, so I knew they would love these pink little treats. When gathering ingredients at the grocery store I ran into my first problem, I couldn't find rosewater! I did end up finding a rosewater at another store that had artificial rose flavor but I'm not a big fan of artificial flavoring for baked goods. All I could think about was a gross soapy tasting cupcake. So I decided to make my own rosewater.

Rosewater:

I found an easy recipe online, picked some pretty roses from my fellow blogger Erin's rose bushes and started to make my rosewater. Half way through I realized that I put too much water in the pot, but there was no turning back. So I just plugged on and made it according to the instructions. The end result looked and smelled lovely, but the taste wasn't very strong. Next time I plan to use less water.

These cupcakes are very easy to make, one bowl and not a lot of ingredients, so I whipped up two batches. I did omit the pistachios and the cardamom. They came out very tasty, but they were lacking the faint rosewater taste due to the diluted rosewater. I then made a vegan buttercream frosting and tinted it pink.

HEAT!

I have an older house that does not have central air and the window air for our front room broke. Normally the heat doesn't bother me at all, but I learned that heat and frosting do not mix well. Therefore, instead of fancy frosted cupcakes I had to spoon the frosting on kind of like a glaze, add pink sugar sprinkles and quickly put them in the freezer to set the frosting into place before moving them to the fridge to wait to be eaten. I plan on trying this recipe again with new rosewater, adding the omitted ingredients and less heat! 


-Chrissy