Chocolate Cupcakes with Mocha Buttercream

I used to hate chocolate cupcakes. Scratch that – I used to hate making chocolate cupcakes. I had mastered a pretty amazing vanilla cupcake, but I struggled to find a good chocolate cupcake recipe. They would always come out dry or not chocolatey enough and needless to say, I always ended up frustrated.

Then I found Martha. She has this “One Bowl Chocolate Cupcake” recipe and it’s pretty much perfect. It’s so simple, as you really only use one bowl, and the cupcakes turn out moist and just chocolatey enough. They aren’t too dense and fudgy so they take well to a heavy chocolate or peanut butter icing.

A good friend of my brother and I, a lovely girl named Kayla (who also has her own blog here), had a birthday this weekend. Unfortunately, since she lives in an apartment, she couldn’t have a big party so we volunteered our house to have the party for her. Naturally, I made cupcakes. She told me she wanted chocolate and since I knew she was also a big fan of coffee, I topped them with a mocha buttercream.

Unfortunately, the reviews were mixed, as about half the people at the party didn’t like coffee (crazy people...). But I still think these are amazing. They’re not too sweet so it’s a nice change.

One-Bowl Chocolate Cupcakes
(Taken from my Martha Stewart Cupcakes book)

Ingredients:

3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1½ cups flour
1½ cups sugar
1½ teaspoons baking soda
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs
3/4 cup warm water
3/4 cup buttermilk
3 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line standard muffin tins with paper liners; set aside.

Sift together cocoa powder, flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, and salt into a large bowl. Add eggs (I actually cheat and lightly beat these first in a separate bowl), warm water, buttermilk, oil, and vanilla, and mix until smooth (about 3 minutes). Scrape down the sides and bottom of bowl to assure batter is well mixed.

Divide batter evenly among muffin cups, filling each about 2/3 full. Bake until tops spring back when touched, about 20 minutes, rotating pan once if needed. Transfer to a wire rack; let cool completely.

Mocha Buttercream

Ingredients:

1/2 cup butter, softened
2 ounces unsweetened chocolate, melted
3 tsp instant espresso
3 tsp hot water
icing sugar
cocoa powder

Directions:

Unfortunately, I suck at using recipes for icing…I kind of just make it up as I go. But basically, first mix your hot water with espresso powder. Then, beat the butter, melted chocolate and espresso mixture together. Now you can add as much icing sugar as you need and beat it in until the buttercream is at the consistency you want. I also added a little bit of cocoa powder to give it some more chocolate flavor.