Ah Fall. Definitely the best season in my opinion. The crisp air, the multicolored leaves, Halloween, pumpkins, and who could forget the fall food! Pumpkin muffins, caramel apples, apple pie, cider, donuts, cinnamon spice goodness, does it get any better?! One thing I have noticed, however, is the unfortunate lack of chocolate as a starring role in any of these fall delicacies, except of course in the Twix and Snickers bars that result from trick-or-treating. Now, I love Swix bars as much as the next person, but I, as a self-proclaimed chocoholic, believe there must be a way to blend chocolate with the fall flavors we know and love, because everything is better with chocolate! While home on fall break with access to an oven (the lack of which is definitely the hardest part of dorm living!) I decided to make a festive fall dessert but still have chocolate as the main ingredient. The result: chocolate pumpkin cupcakes!! I googled around a little and found a recipe that looked very promising from countryliving.com. The only problem was that the chocolate component of the cupcake came from cocoa powder. Now that’s ok but, in my opinion, cocoa powder never really gives a cake as much richness as good old melted bakers chocolate. To solve this problem, I enhanced the cocoa powder’s flavor with three melted bittersweet baking squares. I added it to the wet pumpkin mixture and stirred it in. Voila! They were perfect! Next, I decided to make my cupcakes mini. Mini cupcakes are the best because they have a better cake to frosting ratio, you can give them to more people (and let them all tell you how great of a cook you are), and you can eat just one… or four in a row, if you want to! When the cupcakes were done I frosted them with a classic cream cheese frosting (with a little orange food coloring just to be festive) and sprinkled crushed chocolate chips over the top. These little cupcakes were sweet, moist and both the earthy pumpkin and rich chocolate flavors blended together perfectly! Want to make them yourself? You can find the recipe here.
FYI:
You can add ¾ tablespoon of vinegar to your milk to create buttermilk
Add 2 squares of melted bittersweet chocolate to make them even more delicious
I baked my mini cupcakes for 11 minutes- the batter is very wet so they take longer than usual
3/4 cup(s) Buttermilk (just add ¾ of a tablespoon of vinegar to your milk!)
1 1/2 cup(s) Pumpkin Purée
1 1/2 teaspoon(s) Vanilla Extract
2 1/4 stick(s) Unsalted Butter, softened
1 1/2 cup(s) (firmly packed) Dark Brown Sugar
1 1/2 cup(s) Granulated Sugar
5 large Eggs
Directions
Prepare cake pans: Heat oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly butter three 8-inch cake pans and fit each bottom with an 8-inch circle of parchment paper. Lightly butter the parchment paper. Set aside.
Make the batter: Sift the flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, and nutmeg in a large bowl and set aside. Combine the buttermilk, pumpkin, and vanilla in a medium bowl and set aside. Beat the butter and sugar together in a large bowl, with an electric mixer set on medium speed, until fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition, until the mixture is smooth and light. Alternately add the flour mixture and buttermilk mixture, blending well after each addition.
Bake the cake: Divide the batter among the pans and bake until a wooden skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean -- about 35 minutes. Cool the cakes in the pan for 20 minutes. Remove cakes and cool. (For cupcakes: Heat oven to 375 degrees F. Place cupcake liners in standard cupcake tins and fill each with 1/4 cup of batter. Bake for 22 minutes. (I baked my mini cupcakes for 11 minutes)
CHOCOLATE
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