So far the Sylvia Weinstock classic yellow cake is by far my favorite cake recipe. I have adapted it to make chocolate by replacing some flour with cocoa and it was amazing. I replaced the sour cream for pumpkin and added spice and got a great pumpkin cake.

I would love to have just one go to recipe that I adapt to different flavours. But what do I do if the flavour is a liquid? Can I replace the sour cream with a liquid? i.e. with apple cider to make apple spice cake.

Any ideas how to make this into red velvet?

You could use apple butter in part with the sour cream to make the apple spice cake. As I recall she had milk in her recipe, along with the sour cream, is that right? If so, you can take out 1 TBSP milk and add 1 TBSP flavoring (extracts) to the milk to get the same amount of liquid. You could also use the LorAnn oils which are far more concentrated but pack a wallop of flavor. As for the Red Velvet, don't let Sylvia hear you say that -- she told me she would NEVER make a Red Velvet cake -- too much food coloring!

apple butter is a great idea! I even have some that I made recently in my fridge but I had not thought of it. Thank you!!
There is no milk in the recipe I use which is what is causing some of my difficulty
All that red dye in red velvet is definitely gross but I have a friend who is getting married and really wants red velvet cupcakes for her wedding. I have an oil recipe I have used before but the SW recipe is better so I was hoping to adapt it to red velvet. Don't tell on me lol.