Mint Chocolate Cupcakes

Hi Everyone!  Sorry it has been a really long time since my last post.  Unfortunately, my life hasn’t really slowed down since I arrived in Evanston and for the last few months my camera battery charger was MIA.  Right as I announced that I was going to break down and buy another charger, I made one last ditch effort to find it.  Of course, there it was in the exact drawer that it was supposed to be in, just the previous 30 times I looked in that drawer I was not able to find it.  That is kind of a bummer because during the last two months I have made Nutella cheesecake bars, chocolate chip macadamia nut cookies, homemade Oreos (yum!), pulled pork and buffalo wings.  The good news is that I found the charger in time for my next baking endeavor: mint chocolate cupcakes with a mint swiss meringue buttercream.

These cupcakes were made for my friend/labmate’s birthday this week.  He gave me two options for his birthday treat, either mint and chocolate or butterscotch.  Since it had been a little while since I last busted out the swiss meringue buttercream frosting I opted to make cupcakes.  Despite, what seemed like my best efforts to ruin the cupcakes, they turned out super delicious.  The cupcakes were moist and fluffy while packing a nice chocolate punch and a delicate mint flavor.  I used my go-to chocolate sour cream cake recipe because it is essentially fool proof and an easy one bowl recipe.

Unfortunately, my brain was off while I was baking this weekend and I made several mistakes.  Most notably, when I was adjusting the mint level of the batter I wasn’t entirely too thrilled with the strong spearmint flavor in the extract so I only used a teaspoon.  In order to ramp up the minty-ness I thought it would be a great idea to throw in two handfuls of chopped Andes mints…horrible idea.  The minute I threw in the mints they all sunk to the bottom of the bowl!  Then it dawned on me that when I scoop those mints into the cupcake tins they will once again sink to the bottom where they will char.  Luckily, I was able to remove the majority of the mints and some batter into another bowl.  Yikes…  The good news is that the cupcakes were still a hit with the group and quickly disappeared.  So if you have some time I would definitely suggest giving these a try but maybe go with crème de menthe rather than mint extract.  If you do, let me know how it goes.

Mint Chocolate Cupcakes

Ingredients

Mint Chocolate Sour Cream Cupcakes

2 cups all-purpose flour
2 1/2 cups sugar
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (I used Hershey’s Dark Cocoa)
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup neutral vegetable oil
1 cup sour cream
1 1/2 cups water
2 Tbsp distilled white vinegar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp mint extract
2 eggs

Mint Swiss Meringue Buttercream

1 ¼ cups granulated sugar
4 egg whites
2 ½ sticks unsalted butter, cold and cut into Tbsp size pieces
1 tsp vanilla extract
~1 tsp of mint extract
8 drops of green food coloring, optional

Toppings

1-3 oz of melted chocolate
~1 cup of chopped Andes mints

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Butter the bottoms and sides of two cupcake pans. Line the bottom of each pan with a round of parchment or waxed paper and butter the paper or use a baking butter spray.  This baking spray is one of my secret weapons.

2.  Sift or gently mix the flour, sugar, cocoa powder, baking soda and salt.  Once the dry ingredients are assembled and gently mixed, add the oil and sour cream and whisk until the ingredients are just combine.  Continue to mix the batter while slowly adding the water into the mixture.

3.  Blend in the vanilla and mint extract and the vinegar.  Finally, whisk in the eggs.

4.  Fill the cupcake tins about 3/4^th of the way and bake for 12-15 minutes or until the cupcakes pass the toothpick test.  After a minute of cooling in the pan, gently remove the cupcakes and place on a cooling rack.

5.  While the cupcakes are cooling you can prepare the swiss meringue buttercream.  I am sure I have already ranted about how much I love this frosting so I will spare you all this time and hop right to the recipe.  In a heat proof bowl of an electric mixer, combine the egg whites and the sugar.

6.  Over a double boiler heat the egg white and sugar mixture until it is smooth and all of the sugar has dissolved.  To prevent uneven heating continuously whisk the mixture.

7.  When the sugar is dissolved, return the bowl to the stand mixer and allow the mixture and bowl to cool to about room temperature.  Using the whisk attachment, turn the mixer on high and beat the mixture until stiff peaks form.

8.  At this point, keep the whisk on high but add the butter a few tablespoons at a time.  When all of the butter has been incorporated beat in the vanilla and mint extract and the food coloring and set aside in a cool place.  Do not put the frosting in the refrigerator like I did.  The frosting hardens and even when I tried to warm it up the frosting separated.  If this does happen to you, put the frosting back into the mixer and using the whisk attachment, beat the frosting on high for maybe 5 minutes.  The frosting should come back together and be smooth.

9.  Once all of the cupcakes are completely cool, frost in any fun pattern that you desire and enjoy!

For my labmate, I wanted to pipe the frosting on to give the cupcakes a nice clean look, but on cupcake number 3 the frosting bag split at the seam and squirted green frosting over a few cupcakes.  After that I went the old school route and used a butterknife.  When in doubt, you can always hide a less than desirable frosting job by sprinkling or drizzling something on the top of the cupcake.  In this case, I did both.  Even though I had several mishaps occur the cupcakes were fantastic and I hope you get a chance to try them out.  Happy eating!