Chocolate Brownie Cupcakes

My friend Maki asked me to do three desserts for her Studio Grand Opening: cake pops, cookies, and cupcakes. Since the cake pops were with fruit and the cookies were sugar cookies I decided she needed something with chocolate to balance the dessert table. The book “125 best Cupcake recipes” from Julie Hasson is really great for some inspiration. However, most of the chocolate cupcake recipes uses buttermilk and at that time I had none in my house. But fear not, there is a simple solution.

The Chocolate Brownie Cupcake don’t need buttermilk and how genius is that anyway? Combining a cupcake and a brownie? Yeah! That’s what I thought as well.

Ingredients:

– 3/4 flour
– 1&2 cup cocoa powder
– 1 tsp. baking powder
– 1/4 tsp. salt
– 2/3 cup sugar
– 2/3 cup brown sugar
– 3/4 cup unsalted butter, melted
– 1/2 tsp. vanilla
– 1/2 tsp. almond extract
– 3 eggs
– 2/3 cup semisweet chocolate chips

Tip 1: I left out the almond extract, it seems too strong for me.

First of all, combine flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, and salt. Set aside. In a separate bowl, mix sugar and brown sugar as well as butter until smooth and without lumps. Add vanilla and almond. Then crack the eggs one at a time and combine into the mixture. Finally, mix in the flour mix and chocolate chips and combine well.

Bake at 160°C for about 25 to 28 min. The top will not spring back and will likely fall in somewhat. Make sure you do not over bake the cupcakes. Let them cool in the pan for 10 min, remove and place on a wire rack.

The suggested frosting for these cupcakes are: Coffee Ice Cream, Chocolate Fudge Frosting, or Coffee Buttercream. Since I am not a fan of coffee and think that brownies are dark and rich in themselves I let that pass. Instead, I decided for a simple whipping cream frosting. Actually, it’s not even a frosting, it’s just simple whipping cream.

Ingredients:

– 1 cup whipping cream
– 1/4 cup icing sugar
– 2 tbsp. almond-flavourd syrup

Tip 2: Again, not so much for the almond flavour, besides, I had no syrup anyway. Leave it out, it works just fine.

Whip all ingredients together until stiff peaks are forming. Start with a lower setting and then turn on high. Make sure you do not over whip, otherwise you end up with, well, butter. Transfer to a piping bag with a big star tip and decorate the cupcakes. You can sprinkle some decoration on it as well, if you feel like it.

They were moist, chocolatey and just extremely delicious. The whipping cream works perfectly with the chocolate and sets a nice balance in the flavour.

Happy baking!