Posts tagged ‘chocolate’

Nov 2

Chocolate Peanut Butter Cup Cupcakes

This month’s theme ingredient for Cupcake Hero is peanut butter. Peanut butter is one of my favorite foods and a definite staple in our kitchen cabinets. I had a couple of ideas for a peanut butter-themed cupcake and this post will show you my first one, the chocolate peanut butter cup cupcake. I realize that the chocolate and peanut butter combination will probably be quite popular in the competition, but they just taste so great together that I figure that one can’t have enough chocolate and peanut butter cupcakes! I’m not sure if I’ll get around to my second idea, as we’re preparing to move overseas at the end of the month so we’ll be quite busy.

It might come as no surprise that the inspiration for my chocolate peanut butter cup cupcake came from Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, one of my favorite foods in the candy aisle.

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My peanut butter cupcake is covering himself in a chocolate peanut butter shell that also holds a pool of creamy peanut butter in the bottom. The cupcake is double-coated with chocolate ganache and a little peanut sits on top. Read more

Oct 18

31 Comments

Ice Cream Sundae Cupcakes

A child’s birthday is a very special event, not only for the child but also for the parents. On that special day, however many years ago, you were blessed with the birth of your child and he or she is now another year older. Read more

Oct 12

39 Comments

Dulce De Leche Pumpkin Cupcakes

Unfortunately, dulce de leche isn’t available in most stores, but you can make it yourself at home quite easily with a can of sweetened condensed milk. Read more

Oct 7

44 Comments

Zombie Halloween Cupcakes

A couple of weeks ago I was leisurely browsing through Bake It Pretty, in particular the Halloween decorations. When I saw the zombie hand cupcake toppers, I knew I had to order them and make a batch of Halloween cupcakes. I have never made a Halloween cupcake before; the closest I’ve came were these pumpkin cupcakes with cinnamon cream cheese frosting, but they weren’t exactly scary!

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But these are! This is what I created with Martha Stewart’s awesome Halloween cupcake liners, Bake It Pretty’s zombie hand toppers and a couple of Oreo cookies. Read more

Sep 22

9 Comments

Dark Chocolate Bacon Cupcakes

At the end of this post, feel free to cast your vote as to whether you would try a dark chocolate bacon cupcake!

You either love it or you hate it – the dark chocolate bacon cupcake. When I first heard about this cupcake over at No One Puts Cupcake In A Corner I was instantly disgusted. I understand it’s that sweet and salty combination that you find in chocolate-covered peanuts or chocolate-covered pretzels. But bacon in a dark chocolate cupcake? I certainly don’t think so!

Months and months went by, and for some reason I kept seeing this chocolate bacon cupcake pop up at other baking blogs and even professional cupcake bakeries. Recently, a new chocolate and bacon combination (well, it was new to me, anyway) was being sold at a local festival – chocolate-covered bacon.

I wondered if I could even be paid to eat a piece of chocolate-covered bacon! But curiosity finally won over, and last week, as we had a package of bacon in the refrigerator, I decided to melt a little bit of my chocolate and dip a piece of bacon in it.

It felt like I was doing something bad, and I was even appalled that I was letting myself attempt this flavor combination. I reluctantly took that first bite, and a second, and I thought that it wasn’t as bad as I had expected. I couldn’t even have explained the taste that I was experiencing. However, the fact that I had chocolate and pig meat in my mouth at the same time overwhelmed me and I couldn’t continue eating that piece of chocolate-covered bacon!

Well, a few days went by, and I decided that I’d actually try out those dark chocolate cupcakes that apparently everyone was raving about.

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I used my own favorite dark chocolate cake recipe, from Hershey’s Kitchens, and is the exact same recipe you’ll find on a tub of Hershey’s Special Dark Cocoa. The batter for this cake is thin and watery and I decided to add my crispy, chopped up bacon on top of the batter after I had poured the batter into the cupcake liners. I didn’t mix the bacon into the batter because I was worried the bacon would sink to the bottom.

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The dark chocolate frosting is from Hershey’s as well, and is the same recipe that is on the back of the Hershey’s Special Dark Cocoa tub. I sprinkled leftover crispy bacon on top of each cupcake. It’s best to sprinkle the bacon on immediately after frosting each cupcake to ensure that the bacon will stick to the frosting (otherwise the frosting might set up and the bacon will just fall off).

I had to try one of these cupcakes as soon as I frosted and bacon-sprinkled the very first one. I admit, I was nervous. But it wasn’t quite as bad as I had expected. What I definitely didn’t like was that even though the bacon in the batter was crispy when I added it, it turned softer and chewy in the baked cupcake. The crispy bacon on top was a nice crunchy touch, and gave the cupcake it’s main taste of bacon.

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In the end, I decided that I didn’t like these cupcakes and put the rest of them in the refrigerator. But guess what happened on the next day? I tried one straight from the refrigerator and it tasted better! My husband never got brave enough to try a dark chocolate bacon cupcake; my 4-year-old daughter only likes frosting, so she never tried one either, except a spoon of frosting; my 2-year-old son ate these cupcakes up like there was no tomorrow.

I can definitely say I would never make a dark chocolate bacon cupcake again. However, I am still interested in trying some of the other bacon cupcakes out there, like French toast and bacon cupcakes, or caramel bacon cupcakes.

Find the Milwaukee Cupcake Queen’s original dark chocolate bacon cupcake recipe at No One Puts Cupcake In A Corner.

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Sep 19

14 Comments

Microwave Chocolate Mug Cake

I was a huge skeptic of the microwave mug cake when I first heard about it, well over a year ago now. How could a microwave produce a good cake? I tried out the recipe soon and discovered that the microwave could not produce a good cake! I believe I overcooked it, as it was super rubbery and barely edible.

I gave it one more chance earlier this year, and cooked it for less time. I even added chocolate chips that time. But no, I still didn’t consider it to be edible. I gave up on it and decided to never “bake” a cake in the microwave again.

Well, my sweet tooth got the best of me last week and there were no sweets in the house. I decided to try out the microwave mug cake just one last time. But this time I’d add frosting.

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I only cooked the cake for 2 minutes and 30 seconds, but ended up taking it out with only 10 seconds remaining – I did not want to overcook it this time and have it turn into yet another rubber bouncy cake ball. I cut the mug cake into four slices and made two cakes out of them. I layered the inside of each one with chocolate sour cream frosting and then completely frosted the outside of each one, complete with a ring of white sprinkles.

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And you know, it wasn’t quite as bad as my previous attempts at this cake. I did try a different recipe this time, but I think it was just the fact that I didn’t overcook it this time that made it taste slightly better (it wasn’t too rubbery this time!). My chocolate sour cream frosting was just a thrown together made-up mix of melted semisweet chocolate, sour cream and vanilla. It made the end result taste more like bittersweet chocolate.

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I stored one of the tiny cakes in the refrigerator and I have to say that the refrigerated cake was much, much better. The cake and frosting both firmed up and reminded me of a mud cake. I was pleasantly surprised.

I’m still not a fan of the microwave mug cake. If one had the time to prepare the ingredients, as well as frosting as I did, you may as well just do it the real way and bake up a small batch of cupcakes in a real oven!

What’s your take on the microwave chocolate mug cake?

Find the recipe for this particular mug cake at Recipezaar. Note that I did not use the full amount of sugar, I reduced it to about 3 or 3.5 tablespoons, and I used Hershey’s Special Dark cocoa.

Sep 16

2 Comments

Chocolate Oatmeal Cookies

I’m not sure if I was looking in the wrong place, but it seems I had a hard time finding a chocolate oatmeal cookie recipe. I could have just made up my own recipe, or a sort of Frankenstein combination, if you will, of a few different cookie recipes, but just as I was about to give up and do that, I found what I was after at Hershey’s Kitchens.

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A dark chocolate cookie with oats and chocolate chips! I used Hershey’s Special Dark cocoa powder for these, and replaced the nuts in their recipe with semisweet chocolate chips.

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These cookies are so dark! I had a little trouble baking them, as I found that the middles stayed quite gooey, which made me want to bake them longer, but that resulted in a crunchier cookie. They’re actually quite chewy, and very chocolatey, although they become a little crunchier anyway the next day.

Oddly enough, the kids weren’t too fond of these; they’d eat about half of a cookie and leave the rest. That was fine with me though, it left more for the rest of us! :)

Sep 13

5 Comments

English Toffee

I’m not too fond of hard candy, but I’ve been determined to make my own toffee for a few months now. I kept putting it off because, like a lot of others, I was scared of using the candy thermometer! In my search for an easy toffee recipe, I came across Paula Deen’s, which looked super easy.

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So I gave it a go and was surprised at how easy it actually was. The only part of the recipe that wasn’t entirely clear was adding the vanilla and salt – I found that I needed to really stir the vanilla in there to get it evenly mixed and for it turn that beautiful caramelly-toffee color.

After spreading the toffee in the cookie sheet and spreading out the chocolate with an offset spatula, I topped about 1/4 of the toffee with M&M’s, for the kids, another 1/4 with chopped pecans, and the rest I left plain. After it was completely cool (I ended up putting it in the refrigerator for about 30 minutes!) and the chocolate was hardened, I chopped it into pieces.

Obviously I did not strictly follow Paula Deen’s recipe – she had mixed the pecans into the actual toffee and left the top of the chocolate plain.

The toffee tasted fantastic and was absolutely perfect! I’d highly recommend this super easy recipe for toffee and don’t be scared of using a candy thermometer! :)

Sep 10

4 Comments

Cowboy Cookies

Okay, so that wasn’t much of a hiatus, was it! Let’s just say that I guess I won’t be going on a hiatus, I just won’t be updating quite as often!

Anyway, what did bring me out of my hiatus was Bakerella’s post about cowgirl/boy cookies. Her cookie-mix-in-a-jar was so adorable! I’m definitely going to be using that idea for gifts. Her recipe for cowgirl/boy looked so easy that I decided to quickly mix up the ingredients and bake a batch while my little boy was taking a nap.

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I couldn’t find the pink M&M’s that Bakerella used, but they can be bought at the M&M’s online shop. I just used the regular color mix of M&M’s.

These cookies were fantastic! I thought they tasted best straight out of the oven, but even on the third day they still tasted great. I think that this particular cookie-mix-in-a-jar would be a great gift for anyone, and I’d highly recommend that you go and make a batch of these for yourself too! :)

Aug 5

11 Comments

Lemon Chocolate Cupcakes

I was this close to entering July’s Iron Cupcake: Earth herb challenge, but couldn’t find the herbs I wanted – I wanted them fresh. But I decided to go ahead and try the cupcake I wanted to make, but without the herbs, just for fun. It ended up being one of my favorite cupcakes that I’ve made thus far.

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And it certainly is pretty! It’s a devil’s food cupcake, frosted with lemon cream cheese frosting and decorated with a homemade candied lemon peel.

The cupcake recipe I chose is from Martha Stewart. It’s the second time I’ve used this particular recipe and I decided that I really like it enough to be my current favorite chocolate cupcake recipe. It uses sour cream in the batter, which gives the batter a beautiful-looking creamy texture. The cake itself bakes up soft and moist, but still firm.

I’ve never eaten lemon cream cheese frosting, and I am admittedly not a fan at all of cream cheese. But if it’s sweetened enough I think it tastes really nice as a frosting. I found the recipe at allrecipes.com. I ended up not having to use all of the confectioners’ sugar; I believe I only used 4 cups, rather than the full 5 cups. It is really creamy and lemony; if I ever need a lemon frosting recipe again, I’ll definitely be choosing this one.

What really put the lemon in the cake, though, was the homemade candied lemon peel. I found the recipe for this from Whole Foods Market. These turned out extremely lemony and tasted great on the cupcakes.

The main inspiration for these lemon chocolate cupcakes came from a memory of eating a Lindt lemon chocolate bar. It’s pretty crazy because I cannot find that Lindt lemon chocolate bar anymore, but I’m pretty sure that they did exist and that I did eat one!

Jul 26

10 Comments

Faux Hostess Cupcakes

On a recent visit to My Baking Addiction I saw a faux Hostess cupcake. Like Jamie, I keep seeing these cupcakes over and over again and have tried to keep from baking them myself. I thought that there were way too many out there already, and they looked just a little time-consuming. But Jamie’s version was the very last straw for me, they looked so absolutely irresistible!

So, at the very next opportunity I had, I made my own version.

I used Martha Stewart’s devil’s food cupcake recipe for the cake. I really like this particular recipe. It makes a beautiful smooth batter and a very nice firm, yet moist and tender, chocolately cake. I divided the original recipe in half and ended up with 17 cupcakes!

For the cream filling, I used Annie’s Eat’s marshmallow filling recipe that she used in her faux Hostess cupcakes. I chose this because I didn’t want to take the time to make the 7-minute frosting that I have mainly seen used for filling in these cupcakes (next time I will use it though). I have to agree with Annie that the filling isn’t as light as in the commercial version, but it is definitely suitable, and yummy, to use in these cupcakes. As per Annie’s recipe, I also used the filling to pipe the swirls on top of the cupcakes (with added cream).

For the chocolate glaze I also used the same one that Annie used in her faux Hostess cupcakes. I used the full recipe and ended up with exactly enough glaze to double-dip all of the 17 cupcakes.

They are reminiscent of the real Hostess cupcakes, but no, they are definitely not an exact replica! However, they are extremely delicious! I preferred the taste of these the day after baking. I stored them in the refrigerator and also preferred them at room temperature.

They are a little time-consuming, but they are oh so worth it!