mimosa cupcakes

i've been wanting to make these mimosa cupcakes for a couple of months now and i finally have a reason to. my good friend sarah is coming to town from LA and i gave her a list of recipes i've been wanting to try and she picked mimosa. i don't blame her. after reading the comments on the recipe, though, i decided that i needed to spruce these up a lot so that i (and everyone else) wouldn't be disappointed. i used blood orange juice instead of regular orange juice and right after taking the cupcakes out of the oven i poked holes in each one and brushed champagne on. the reason for the blood orange juice is that it is a more subtle flavor than regular orange juice. i didn't want these to just taste like orange cupcakes. the brushed champagne was to add another layer of champagne flavor in case what was in the batter baked out. 

i completely scratched the frosting recipe they have and made a raspberry blood orange buttercream. i used the wilton buttercream recipe as a base but added a lot more powdered sugar, omitted the vanilla and milk, and put in blood orange juice and fresh raspberry sauce (purchased at central market because i'm too lazy/busy to make my own) to taste. the extra powdered sugar was to make it taste less buttery and also stiffen it up because i put a lot more liquid in it than was called for. the decision to use raspberry was based on the fact that it's tart and after the complaints about this being too sweet, i wanted something to cut that sweetness. 

anyway, on with the pictures, right?

cheap champagne and not so cheap blood orange juice

did i mention these were minis? they're minis!

the finished product, complete with gold dust on top

i had enough batter left over to make this mini cake, or giant cupcake, for my dad. the decorating is a bit sloppy but luckily papi doesn't care :) 

stored in the fridge, waiting for happy hour tomorrow!