Strawberry Cupcakes, Part 2

I finally got around to experimenting with the Pretty in Pink Cupcake recipe from Julie Hasson's 125 Best Cupcake Recipes. My first attempt at boosting the strawberry flavor was using jarred strawberries in light syrup instead of "fresh" strawberries. The result? The cupcakes were much pinker (thanks, red food dye!), but oddly enough, they had less strawberry flavor than the cupcakes made with the red yet styrofoamesque fresh berries. Shrug. I think they're going to need extract or some other flavor booster, as Julie suggested earlier. I am going to try one more thing: rehydrating some dried strawberries, then pureeing them with fresh berries.

In the meantime, I'll have to order strawberry extract because it's impossible to find in stores in my area. In my hunt for strawberry extract, I found lime, various mints, and even ginger extracts. But no strawberry. Ginger extract is the sort of thing that gives me ideas, though.

Also in the meantime, I'm going to use the Pretty in Pink Cupcake formula for a batch of raspberry cupcakes. I was able to purchase raspberry extract, and California raspberries have been on sale here for the past week. I think they would be terrific topped with a fudge icing.