Hello lovelies!
It still is snowing without a single break now for a whole week. There is at least 30cm snow everywhere. It just never stops snowing. Hopefully next week shall become a bit warmer, but as long as it’s like this I have to warm my heart in another way! 😉
Some time ago, I tried to challenge myself: I decided to make cute little cupcakes. I don’t like all the colorful toppings (because usually I don’t trust flashy pink or purple food. I am highly distrusting fancy foods like these.) but I do love chocolate to an utmost extent. You can never have enough chocolate. That’s why I decided to give some Rich Chocolate Cupcakes a try!
Now I have to say, I didn’t expect it to be easy. But what happened was something that even I couldn’t have guessed beforehand and that happened to me the very first time. Needless to say, the cupcakes were supposed to be a late birthday gift and therefore, I NEEDED TO SUCCEED. But let’s begin at the start, shall we..? See for yourself what happened… For awesome chocolate cupcakes you’ll need:
Ingredients: (makes 12 – 16) For the frosting:
120gr softened butter 120gr dark chocolate
1 egg 120ml heavy whipping cream
150gr flour 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
120ml buttermilk
56gr cacao powder
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon baking powder
pinch of salt
Preheat oven to 175°
IMPORTANT NOTE! Mix together all the soft and liquid stuff: butter, egg and buttermilk and mix with a hand mixer until everything is blended well together. Now mix together all the powdery stuff in another bowl: flour, cacao powder, bakind powder, vanilla and salt and mix lightly with a spoon(!). When you’re done, mix the two parts together but only mix lightly and fast with the spoon, not a handmixer! The reason for this is that the mixture has to be as light as possible so that the cupcakes will rise. If you stir too long the mixture gets heavier and heavier by the butter and the milk and eventually you’re cupcakes will just become sunken and fail.
Frosting: Melt the chopped chocolate (I always use the microwave: melt 20 seconds, stir chocolate to make sure nothing burns, melt another 20 seconds and so on until it’s melted completely). Preheat a little pan, heat the whipping cream and add the chocolate. Mix as long as it is an even mixture, then add the vanilla. Set aside and pour into a bowl. Refridgerate for 1-2 hours and stir occassionally until it reaches spreading consistency. Be aware! The frosting will thicken until it is impossible to spread it on to the cupcakes so make sure you don’t wait too long! Mine was perfect at about 1 1/2 hours I’d say.
You think I overemphasize..? Well, here was my first try:
So… yeah. KEEP THAT NOTE IN MIND! So this happened: I made the mixture for the cupcakes and mixed everything together reeeeally nice and long because, uh, what can happen if you mix? Nothing, right? Well, as you can see, I was wrong. I never ever heard before that cupcakes or muffins can become sunken. My cupcakes looked good the first 10 minutes but when I checked back some minutes later this was what I encountered!
I was totally shocked T_T I mean, this was supposed to be a birthday gift! Of course, with no cupcake in the middle of the burnt thingies left I couldn’t just throw the frosting over. Plus the edges were pretty burnt, too. So I panicked and I made a second attempt, googling the reason for my failed cupcakes and ta-da: Never overmix your cake mixture! Lesson learned, thank you.
Luckily I didn’t threw the ingredients away and had enough left for a second try! I just divided everything by two because I didn’t have THAT much left. I ended up with having 10 cupcakes but I was just SO happy that I ended up with something.
TA-DA! The end result.
I know the frosting looks shitty BUT keep in mind that I made the frosting while the first try was still in the oven. Since I had to make everything again, of course my frosting would thicken and thicken in the fridge waiting for me. It was almost impossible to spread it on the cupcakes because it was already so thick!! I somehow managed to do it although the kitchen looked like a huge mess afterwards.
I am so proud of these cupcakes! THEY TASTED AMAZING. Extremely chocolate-y, but not too sweet since I used dark chocolate and used only cocoa powder in the cupcake bottom. The bottom itself doesn’t have a strong taste but it goes along really well with the frosting! I freaking loved these cupcakes, so sad I had to share 😛 All my friends loved them and I had to give them the recipe so if you like chocolate you should try it out! 🙂
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Hope you liked this recipe, have a good day everyone!
Much love & Talk to you soon,
Sam
