Chocolate Chip Cupcakes & White Chocolate Buttercream

I'm going to start by saying I don't like Peeps. They're just weird. But I will admit, they do make for a cute cupcake topper. And I'm pretty sure nobody's complaining about these cupcakes. I also decorated a few with Cadbury mini eggs.

You may be wondering why I only made half a cake mix last time, and where is the rest of it. This is just the other half of that chocolate cake mix with some semi-sweet chips added in.

Cake:

1/2 chocolate cake mix

1 egg

1.5 oz vegetable oil
4 oz milk
1/4 cup semisweet chocolate chips

Again, double for the whole cake mix (2 eggs, 1/3 cup oil, 1 cup milk).
This made 12 cupcakes and I just baked according to the directions on the box.

Frosting:

3 oz white chocolate chips, melted

1/2 cup vegetable shortening

1/2 cup butter

1 tsp vanilla

1/8 cup milk
about 5 cups powdered sugar

Cream shortening and butter with vanilla. Add the melted chocolate and some powdered sugar. Mix in the milk and continue to add powdered sugar until you reach the desired consistency. I decide to color it green to contrast my Peeps. I used leaf green gel color.

Happy baking!

Chocolate Red Wine Cupcakes

I've got big plans this weekend! I'm going to the 1st Annual Chuckwagon Races at the Rockin' L Arena in Lacey, AR. I've got a couple people going with me and we'll be hanging out with the family so I'm sure we'll have a big time. And you know I had to make some cupcakes to take with me.

I pinned a red wine cupcake on pinterest a while back. My friend Casey offered these as a choice for cupcakes for this weekend. I'll be honest, I was a little iffy on them. But I decided to give it a shot.

I started with a basic chocolate cake mix. I actually only prepared half the batter. I mixed up half the cake mix, by basically halving the ingredients on the box. Well except the wine. That's definitely not on the box :)

Cake:

1/2 chocolate cake mix

1 egg

1.5 oz vegetable oil

4 oz Cabernet 

I mixed it all up and poured it into 12 lined cupcake wells. It came out perfect for 12 cupcakes. Double this if you're making the whole cake mix. (Comes out to 2 eggs, 1/3 cup oil, 1 cup Cabernet)

As for the Cabernet, I'm not even going to pretend to know anything about wine. I just went to the liquor store and asked the guy for a little bottle of Cabernet. He suggested a box wine, and it was pretty cheap, so I went with it.

Frosting:

3 oz white chocolate chips, melted

1/2 cup vegetable shortening

1/2 cup butter

1 tsp vanilla

1/8 cup Cabernet- more or less to taste

about 5 cups powdered sugar

Cream shortening and butter. Add vanilla and 1 cup powdered sugar. Pour in melted chocolate. Add an additional cup of powdered sugar. Mix in the wine and continue adding powdered sugar until frosting reaches the desired consistency. It was a rather boring shade of pink, so I added pink gel food coloring to brighten it up a bit.

If you decide to try these, let me know what you think in the comments :)

Happy Baking :)

King Cake Cupcakes

So it's the Mardi Gras time of year. We always have king cake multiple times per year it seems. My grandma brought one up in January, but I thought Mardi Gras would be an appropriate time to make my own. And obviously it had to be in cupcake form! Since we had an ice day (the Arkansas equivalent of a snow day) and I was stuck at home, I literally lived in sweatpants and baked all day. These king cakes are easy to make and only took all day because I've been exceptionally lazy. And I've just gotten word that tomorrow is another ice day. Yay.

Crescent rolls and cream cheese play a starring role in several of my most popular non-cupcake desserts. These cupcakes are really no different. Crescent rolls with cinnamon sugar and cinnamon cream cheese filling. And in trying this experiment I just realized that crescent rolls only have 8 rolls per can...

Cupcakes:
2 cans of crescent rolls
cinnamon and sugar for dusting

Filling:
1 package cream cheese (8 oz)
1/2 cup dark brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp ground cinnamon

Icing:
1 cup powdered sugar
1-2 tbsp milk
1 tsp vanilla extract

To prepare the filling mix room temperature cream cheese with brown sugar, vanilla, and cinnamon. I laid out the crescent rolls and sprinkled them with cinnamon sugar. I always keep some cinnamon sugar on hand because it is good for so many things. I simply pour some granulated sugar in a bowl and add a small amount of cinnamon and shake it up. I dropped a spoonful of filling on the larger end of each triangle and wrapped the small end over the filling. I tried to seal the bottom as best I could because I didn't want all the goodness to leak out. It really doesn't matter how you wrap them, just get them in a cupcake liner. I baked them at 350 for probably about 15 minutes. I'm terrible at timing things because I never look at the time when I put them in :)

Cinnamon sugar dusted crescent rolls

Into the oven they go

I mixed up the powdered sugar, milk and vanilla and spooned the icing over the top of the cupcakes. I sprinkled the wet icing with colored sugar. Which, in case you didn't know, is ridiculously hard to get enough sugar to make pretty colors. I hid the babies in several of the cupcakes. I just have to make sure everybody knows to look for them!

How many babies can you see?

These cupcakes would make a good alternative to cinnamon rolls any time of year. And you could play around with the flavors for different tastes and occasions.

Happy Baking!