I’ve been working on Cupcakes since March 8th, 2007.

Yes. These took a while. 
See, March 8th marks the birthday of the woman who introduced me to Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Obviously an important person, a geek in arms. 

We will call this woman “Britt.”
Because that is her name.

Here is a list of things Britt loves:
Harley Quinn
Of Montreal
The Real World
Splinter
South Park
and
Cupcakes.

Britt is a cartoonist, and the wonderful instructional guide to the right is courtesy of her. Britt and I lived together for a year when I moved to New York, and there is no singular person from whom I have learned so much about cooking. I’m sure you had no idea that asparagus boiled in Budweiser was palatable.

It is not.
Of course, Britt and I still argue this point.

Anyways, Britt’s birthday was fast approaching and I wanted to make something extra delicious for my cartoon comrade. Mere cupcakes would not suffice, so I looked for inspiration and ripped a page from Madame De Laurentiis’ book and baked up a round of almond cupcakes. Knowing that Britt would rip the top off the cupcake and invert it, I decapitated each cake and plastered the top back on with a dollop of raspberry whipped cream. The cakes were then stacked on a platter in a giant pyramid and dusted with powdered sugar. A birthday celebration fit for a queen. Queen Britt.

And so, since March 8th, 2007, when I made a tray of lovely princess-y cupcakes for Britt’s b-day, I’ve been thinking of making a gluten free and dairy free version for myself.

Because I was jealous.

I wanted to make gluten free cupcakes as light and delicious as the platter I prepared for Britt, and the experimentation has led me down some horrible paths. Consider, for instance, the batch that began to leech out its oil. Once out of the oven, their tops rejected the oil I had mistakenly thought to be baked into the batter, which left me with vile little grease cakes. Of course, in correcting this mistake I accidentally swung the pendulum too far in the other direction. This time? It seems I had invented foam rubber. Now these cakes had some interest factor. I held one in the palm of my hand, closed my hand (crushing the cake completely) and when I opened my fist, the cake re-inflated, like some perverse stress ball.

I’m sure school children would have loved them-take a bite, stuff it in your pocket, pull it out an hour later and it’ll show no signs of distress.

Gross.

Why am I even telling you about the mistakes?
Because here at Renegade Kitchen I make the mistakes so you can make the food.

The final cupcakes are awesome.

Get ready for the Pretty in Pink Valentine’s Day post.
You might gag it’ll be so cute.

Please don’t.