UPDATED (2014) Weight Watchers 4 PointPlus Red Velvet Cupcakes [Recipe]

This past Valentine’s Day, I decided that I wanted to bake a red velvet cake for the Spousal Unit. As I set out on my mission, I remembered that the wife had just started back on Weight Watchers and was very conscious about what she ate. A brief search on das here Interwebs, and—BLAMO!—Weight Watchers red velvet cake recipes! I soon realized that all the search results were blog re-postings of a recipe originally posted to Food.com in 2005 by a user going by the name mariposa13.

I decided to give it a try. It was only 4 Points a serving, after all.

The cake turned out nice and was a hit with the wife. It was denser than regular cake but still pretty moist and flaky. The frosting, when the pudding and Cool Whip were blended together (more on this later), had a consistency and flavor similar to whipped frosting used by bakeries. Overall, the end results were unmistakably red velvet cake.

However, I wasn't satisfied. I had encountered several stumbling blocks as I prepared the recipe as originally written. These challenges got me thinking about ways to improve and update the recipe. When I learned that I could follow-up on my theories for my final project in the technical writing course I'm taking at Georgia State, I leapt at the opportunity to experiment.

So, dear friends and followers, I am proud to present to you the results of this culinary endeavor. We'll call this the first installment of "Taste Bud Thursdays," a new randomly-recurring series serving as my response to the over-saturation of Throwback Thursdays. I hope you enjoy the results, and—Please!—feel free to comment with your reviews and suggestions for improvement.


INGREDIENTS & INSTRUCTIONS
My notes on how and why I felt that the original recipe needed to be updated can be found after the jump.

Makes 16 servings at 4 PointsPlus each ^[1]

Cake:

• 1 box (16.5 Oz) Duncan Hines Signature Red Velvet Cake Mix ^[2]
• 12 oz diet Dr. Pepper soda ^[3]

Mix cake mix and diet soda. Line cupcake pan with cupcake liners ^[4]. Pour mix into cupcake pan. Bake at 350 for 30 minutes or until toothpick poked into the cake comes out clean. Allow to cool completely.

Frosting:

• 2 small boxes of Jell-o fat-free, sugar-free instant cheesecake pudding mix ^[5]
• 2 cups skim milk
• 4 oz (half a container) fat-free Cool Whip, thawed 

Whisk pudding mix and milk together until smooth. Pudding will thicken as you mix. Once the pudding is thoroughly mixed, add Cool Whip and whisk well. Refrigerate until ready to serve ^[6].


Tips and Things I Learned While Play with My Food:

The Advent of 3D Printing and Redefining Agriculture

Not taking better advantage of Earth Day last week to do a series of environment-friendly posts continues to make me feel like a slacker about myself, this blog, and the environment. To make myself feel better, I though I would:

1. Figure out how to embed and/or link a pdf into blogger. (Coincidently, I also learned how to insert pages/other pdfs into and extract pages from a pdf on a Mac without paying a ton load for Adobe.)
2. Revise my term paper I wrote in March 2013 on 3D Printing and Agriculture for my "People, Plant, and the Environment" botany course at the Dunwoody, Ga. Campus of Georgia Perimeter College.
3. Create a post inviting the world to read my very simple and idealistic paper on how 3D printing technology could one day help solve some of our environmental and energy problems in the hope that it may inspire others to take my very basic idea and save the world. (All I ask is that you give me all the proper credit and citations—monetary donations would also be welcomed should my ideas help you make beaucoup bank.)

Those tasks accomplished, I present to you my paper. Interestingly enough, the only criteria other than formatting that Professor Sharon Lambert gave the class for this term paper was that a) it had to be about plants and b) well, I can't remember if there was actually a "b)".

Title: The Advent of 3D Printing and Redefining Agriculture

Author: T.J. Blackburn

Abstract:
Used mainly for drafting and design, 3D printing, a relatively new technology reminiscent of Star Trek, has recently expanded its practical applications beyond commercial fabrication and manufacturing into the realm of medicine and the sciences. The author briefly explores the impact this technology is having on agriculture and posits the possible role 3D printing could play in alternative fuel production.

Never Gonna Give Up.

One of the things I like about blogger is the "Stats" feature which, coupled with Google Analytics, allows me to see the reach I have. However, the one thing that all the bounce rates and click-thrus doesn't tell me is whether you, my dear readers, enjoy reading my blog. So, even though I've surmounted the fear that no one is reading, I am now struck by the fear that my ramblings may be contributing to what Chad Radford, Staff Music Writer at Creative Loafing, calls the "dumbing down effect" that he says plagues the internet.

Today, a respected acquaintance whom I asked to read this blog contacted me with a very heartening critique. She put into words some of my thoughts about what I'm doing here and rightly assessed that I might not even recognize the direction I'm going. Knowing that she enjoyed my post about Pintertest really made my day. So, just in case she's reading again today, I want to just say thank you.

Radio personality Myron "Magic" Gigger, during an interview on the future of media and how to break into it, once said: "Don't give up, don't be discouraged at all. Don't lose sight of the goal inside all the hard work it takes." Now, I'm still unsure of the goal of this blog but I do know all about putting in the hard work in the hopes of making something you love a success. I do love writing but—as many writers know—writing does not always love you back. Between late nights and long weeks of trying to figure out what to write and how to put ideas into words and the paranoia that no one reads blogs anymore (as several co-works remarked), all of this can take its toll.  But knowing that someone honestly enjoyed my work makes it all worth while.