Experimental Mayo Cupcakes

I've been making the chocolate mayonnaise cupcakes for a while, and after doing one experiment with a lemon batch, as well as scaling it down to a 6-cupcake batch, I figured I would try additional experiments.

First:  flavors.

I've got a variety of extracts in the cabinet: anise, orange, lemon, mint, peppermint, almond, and vanilla.  I've also got half a bottle of rum, peanut butter, and of course chocolate.  I should have halved the recipe for this experiment, but I just ended up with large cupcakes.

Rather than do the math to mix each individually, I cut out the two flavor items (cocoa and vanilla) and just made the batter the normal way.  Then I divided it up into twelve containers to flavor.

It occurred to me that after I took them out of the pan, I'd only be able to tell the chocolate ones, and maybe the peanut butter, apart, so I added food coloring, as well.

I ended up with three chocolate and one each of vanilla (uncolored), rum (lime-green), peanut butter (also uncolored, but... peanut butter colored), mint (green), peppermint (red swirl), almond (pink), anise (purple), orange (... orange), and lemon (yellow).

Some of the flavors definitely work better than others:

• Anise: Interesting, would make again
• Almond: Okay, prefer as frosting
• Rum: Disappointing, too much flavor cooks out; better as frosting
• Mint: Tastes like spearmint Trident, too weird
• Peanut butter: Not bad, would make again, with chocolate frosting
• Vanilla: Not bad as a yellow cake
• Peppermint: Good flavor, maybe seasonal?
• Orange:  Not bad, maybe better with orange frosting, but works better with the lighter texture of chiffon cake
• Lemon: Way too strong this time around; might try again more diluted, but I think also works better as muffins... with poppy seeds, of course

The rum's coloring turned out well, but the flavor was barely there.  The rest at least tasted like what they were supposed too.  The vanilla turned out pretty well - the recipe could definitely be adapted to a readily scalable yellow cake the same way I do with the chocolate version.

Next experiment: just how small a batch can feasibly be baked.