Chocolate Covered Cherry Cupcakes on a Smokey Day

Northern California is on fire. We had an electrical storm last weekend and it has set more that 800 fires in Northern Calif.. More then 100 of those fires are in Shasta County. That's were I live. Many of those fires aren't even manned because resources are spread so thin. The air is thick with smoke and there is a thin layer of ash covering everything.

With air quality warnings in effect, it was a good day to stay in doors. So when my daughter asked to make a cake, I talked her into cupcakes. And to clean out the pantry, she used a can of Cherries and a boxed cake mix. But you could make your own cake batter, if that is more your style. For a 13 year old in my kitchen, were staying with the box of mix!


She made the cake mix, drained the cherries, and divided them between the cupcakes.



Then covered with chocolate batter.

Baked and frosted with an almond buttercream.

I was going to let her use a pastry bag and a large tip to make beautiful swirls of frosting on the cupcakes, but, my tip got gobbled up by the darn garbage disposal.

Yea... I kind of need to replace that!

They're expecting more thunderstorms this weekend.

God Bless the firefighter!!!