Super Chocolate-y Cupcakes

Caution: do not lick the screen. Just follow the recipe below and it will all be okay

The most chocolatey cupcakes you will ever eat. People love these, they really do. And it’s easy to see (and taste!) why. There is something about the age-old combination of chocolate on chocolate which just works. You can't explain that.

You will note that there is no butter, instead using oil and buttermilk, and this gives a rich and moist sponge base for the super-fudgy icing to be slathered ontop of. If you don’t have buttermilk don’t worry, I find that you can substitute this for the same amount of milk with one tbsp of lemon juice. Or failing that, you can use half milk and half yogurt to make up the desired amount. Regular milk won’t give you the same consistency.

This is one of my favourite things to bake because they always turn out spot on.

Vanilla sugar in the cutest dish ever

 makes approx 12 cupcakes

Ingredients for the cakes

• 1 ¼ cups flour
• ½ cup cocoa
• ¾ tsp baking soda
• ¼ tsp salt
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 tsp vanilla
• ¾ cup buttermilk
• 1/3 cup oil

Ingredients for the icing

• 1 ½ cups icing sugar
• ½ cup coca
• ½ cup butter
• 1-3 tbsp milk
• Pinch of salt

Method

Preheat oven to 180 degrees, and prepare a cupcake tin with approx a dozen cupcake wrappers.

Mix the dry ingredients for the cake. 

In a large bowl whisk together the sugar, oil, egg and vanilla until lighter and smooth.

To this mixture, alternately add the flour then the butter milk, stirring well between each addition. 

The buttermilk looks a bit weird because I used the same cup to measure it as I used to measure the cocoa

Start with 1/3 of the flour, then add in half the buttermilk, then 1/3 of the flour, followed by the rest of the milk. 

Finally add in the rest of the flour and mix well until smooth.

Divide between the cupcake cases and bake for 25 minutes.

Let cool in the tin for 15 minutes before removing to a wire cooling rack to cool completely before icing.

A few went a bit rogue, but icing will solve all problems

While they are cooling, make the icing. This couldn’t be simpler. Add all the ingredients except the milk into a food processor. Mix well, and add enough milk to get a smooth pipe-able consistency.

To finish, ice the cooled buns.

I prep the piping bag (disposable) by snipping off the end so that my chosen nozzle fits comfortably. I then fold down the sides slightly and place in upright in a glass to allow me to use both hands to fill it.

Spoon the icing into the prepared piping bag and twist the end until you have a tight seal around the icing inside. 

Push the icing out by twisting the end, forcing it out the shaped nozzle. I tend to just pipe simply in a circle, piled high in the centre, or in swirls. 

But there are tons of different designs out there. 

Finish with some sprinkles or whatever you have to hand. If you don’t have anything to decorate it doesn’t really matter as these are delicious anyway!