Last Saturday marked the end of the Little League spring season. This is my son’s 3^rd year of baseball and will forever be remembered as the season he fell in love with the sport. The boy lives, eats, and breathes baseball now. Mind you, I have no athletic ability and no interest in sports, but I love watching him out there. He’s made me a fan of baseball. The Naughty One and Blake’s grandparents made it to every game this season. They’re his biggest fans!

Just a few years ago, my dad was thrilled to take the boy to his first Angels game. Once they got there though, all the boy wanted to do was get snacks from the snack bar. They spent a lot of time going back and forth to the concession stands. They ended up making a great memory ~ a flat tire and a game of cards in the parking lot afterward. I don’t think they could even tell you who won the game that day.                                                        

When we weren’t spending our waking hours out on the ball field these past few months, we were watching it on television… every game over and over again. Every game is like a final exam. Throughout the game (all nine innings), I’m asked questions like,  “Let’s say there is a player on first and a player on third base. When the next player bats, where should the ball be thrown?”. Heck if I know. Luckily, I have the baseball nut to explain the plays in detail to me.

                                                                                                                                                                                                    I made cupcakes and cookie favors for our end of season celebration. I had extra cookie dough left over after making the large baseball cookies and decided to make team cupcake toppers with their University team letter on them. I googled to see what the “f” for Fullerton looked like. I made small cookies, piped and flood them blue, and then used Wilton tip #1 for the letters. I was happy with how they turned out, as I don’t consider myself the greatest at piping.

The cupcakes were amazing! I finally have found my standard go-to white cake recipe. There is no need to look any further. This is it! It uses a boxed cake mix, but I challenge anyone to come up with a moister cake from scratch than this one. It truly tastes like wedding cake, light and moist, and flavorful. You can adapt this recipe in a ton of ways. I made them with a slight lemon flavor. Traditional wedding cakes often use almond flavoring, so feel free to omit the lemon extract and add almond instead. Just remember that extracts are strong, a little goes a long way.

The white icing I used on these is my standard white frosting that I use when I’m making cupcakes for kids. It has kid appeal, in that it tastes almost exactly like the grocery store bakery icing tastes like. This may be too sweet for some, but no child has objected yet!

                                                                                                                                                                                            White Wedding Cake Cake/Cupcake Recipe

Adapted from Recipezaar.com

1 box Duncan Hines white cake mix

1 cup flour

1 cup sugar

3/4 tsp. salt

1 1/3 cups water

1/8 cup vegetable oil

1 tsp. vanilla extract

1/2 tsp. lemon extract *

1 cup sour cream

4 large egg whites

1 ½  tsp. lemon zest

Place all dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl and stir together with a whisk.  Add remaining ingredients and beat on medium for 3 minutes, scraping down the bowl  halfway through mixing.  Pour into greased and floured cake pans or cupcake tins.  Fill about half way full.

Bake in a preheated 325 degree oven until tests done (about 16 minutes)

*you may substitute 1 tsp. almond extract for another flavor option