TWD: Chocolate-Chocolate Cupcakes

Remember last week when I told you that I was a cupcake girl? Well, I still am, and this week's Tuesdays with Dorie project was right up my alley! Clara from I Heart Food 4 Thought chose Dorie's Chocolate-Chocolate Cupcakes for us to bake and I couldn't have been happier about it.

Dorie's cupcakes are deeply chocolatey little cakes with a light and tender crumb that are topped with an intensely rich, bittersweet chocolate glaze. They're made with all of the regular cupcake ingredients plus buttermilk and both cocoa powder and melted bittersweet chocolate for some extra chocolate "oomph". Some of my TWD colleagues commented that they found their cupcakes to be a little dry. After having that same issue with my Pumpkin Muffins last week, I made sure to slightly undercook these cupcakes, removing them from the oven after about 20 minutes. Letting them sit on the counter in the cupcake pan for a few minutes finished them off and they turned out perfectly.

As per Clara's request, I decided to go "seasonal" with these cupcakes and decorated them with a Halloween theme. I used orange sprinkles on some and little sugar pumpkins and tombstones on others. I also topped a few with some vanilla buttercream that I tinted orange. Variety is the spice of life, after all!

One of Dorie's suggestions in the book for "playing around" with these cupcakes is to fill them with jam, Nutella, ganache or marshmallow cream. Marshmallow cream!?!? Oooh! I was immediately reminded of one of my favorite childhood treats - Hostess Snowballs. You remember them, don't you? They're little domes of chocolate cake, filled with cream and enrobed in gooey, coconut-coated marshmallow. Mmmm! Love. Them. So, I broke out a jar of marshmallow cream, tinted it orange too and stuffed those cupcakes with it. They were damn good!

If you're in the mood for some fabulous chocolate cupcakes, I can heartily recommend these devilishly delicious little guys. Gussy them up with something orange and they're a perfect Halloween treat for your nearest and dearest. Of course, you could just hide them in the garage fridge and hoard them all for yourself. Not that I would ever do something like that. I'm just sayin'.

If you'd like to try these on your own, you can find the recipe in Dorie's Baking: From My Home to Yours and also on Clara's site. It's also worth a visit to the TWD blogroll to see what the rest of the gang has come up with.

Enjoy!