Tuesday, October 28, 2008

TWD: Chocolate-Chocolate Cupcakes

I wish I didn't wait till the last minute to make all these blog-group recipes - it always seems like I'm making them the day before I've got to post. Unfortunately, I'm pretty short on time these days and I just can't seem to plan much past tomorrow, let alone a week from tomorrow. I would have loved to make a double batch of these cupcakes and bring them with me to a meeting scheduled for tonight (sorry Ladies, next time I'll try to plan ahead a little!).


As you can see, I got in touch with my inner Martha and went with the Halloween theme. I used some crushed oreos for the dirt (my three year old had lots of fun helping me dispose of all that leftover oreo middle stuff) and milano cookies for the gravestones. It would have been awfully fun to make a full-fledged graveyard had I made this a double batch!

I liked these cupcakes but I was expecting them to be really chocolaty. They're not. In fact, they've got a pretty light texture and are quite tender. I guess I thought that with a double "chocolate" in the title I was expecting them to be fudgier - I generally like a slightly denser cake like pound cake. (If that's what you like in a cupcake, I highly recommend Martha's One-Bowl Chocolate cake recipe - I've made it many times and it's wonderful and definitely on the "devil's food" side of chocolate cake.) Dorie gives a chocolate ganache "glaze" to frost her cupcakes with and works very nicely with the light chocolate flavor of the cupcakes. By the way - I wouldn't use that ganache with Martha's cupcake recipe, because oh my, would that be over-the-top (never mind that glass of milk, just chug straight from the gallon, you'd need it!)

I wish I had remembered to take pictures of the batter because my only note to you all would be not to worry about how thick it is. It's definitely more similar to muffin batter than cake batter. I had to stop and look over the recipe again just to make sure I had put in the right amount of buttermilk. Don't fret though, these cupcakes come out really nice and light.

Thanks Clara of I Heart Food4Thought for selecting this week's frightfully good recipe! Check out all the other wonderful TWD bakers here. These folks are so incredibly talented - it'll be fun to see how creative they got with the whole Halloween theme!

Next week: Rugelach - which I've never made but always wanted to try, so lucky me! I'm going to try really hard to stick all of these in the freezer and save them for Christmas - one less batch of cookies to squeeze in!
I haven't forgotten about posting that Creme Brulee Cheesecake either, just been busy, busy, busy. I'm hoping to post it Thursday (but don't hold me to that :-)

23 comments:

Susan @ SGCC said...

Your cupcakes are adorable! The tombstones are very clever! Love them!

Cathy said...

Laura, those cupcakes are adorable! What a great idea! My kiddos would love them to death (bad pun intended!). What a fun Halloween treat. I have to admit that I am MIGHTY intrigued by that Martha one bowl recipe.

Sihan said...

i agree with you on Martha's one bowl recipe. Those are reallie moist and SOLID!

Love the tombstones!

Shelby said...

Love your decorated cupcakes! I'll have to try Martha's one bowl recipe however I loved this one!

Nancy/n.o.e said...

Those graveyard cupcakes are the best things, ever! The dirt, the tombstones, the RIP... cute. I'm going to have to make a note of Martha's cake. Devil's Food is my kind of chocolate cake.
Nancy

Prudy said...

They look so cute! I've never done the graveyard, and every year I say I will. Maybe I can squeeze it in. Lovely work!

Andrea at Nummy Kitchen said...

Your cupcakes are too cute! I love the little tombstones, what a fun Halloween treat. I have never tried the Martha recipe but now you have me wanting to just to compare the two. I like dense and fudgey if I'm going for chocolate so I bet I'd really like it. I just saw your pot pie from Barefoot Bloggers last week and it looks just perfect, I love how you did it in a 9 by 13 dish! Makes me want to make it again :)

The Food Librarian said...

So cute (great minds think alike, no?! :) I love the "dirt" too! So adorable and scary. Did you eat all the leftover cookies... munch, munch.

Lady Baker said...

i love the use of milano cookies AND Oreos...now that's a cupcake totally up my alley!

chocolatechic said...

Oh...they look great!

Flourchild said...

Ya I thought the batter was extra thick too. I like your decorations..very cute. I did spider webs..easy!

CB said...

Love the oreo dirt and milan tombstones! Great job. Thanks for baking with me this week!
Clara @ iheartfood4thought

NKP said...

I get behind too, then I find myself making a couple of things on the same day!
Your cupcakes are adorable - great job! I love the gravestones.
Is Martha's one bowl recipe from one of her books?

Engineer Baker said...

Milanos as tombstones - brilliant! Love the decorations.

Laura said...

Natashya - Martha's got that recipe in her Baking Handbook page 168, but you can find it on her website at the link in my post.

TeaLady said...

Love the dirty cupcakes. They are adorable. I wish I could find my inner martha. They look great.

Laura said...

Thanks for stopping into real mom kitchen today. Just wanted to let you know I posted my frosting recipe with the cookie recipe now.

Katrina said...

Love the "small town" graveyard! Cute. I went with birthday sprinkles, but thought they same as you and many others, not chocolatey enough of a cake. Oh well, it was still fun.
Cute blog!Gonna have to try that Martha recipe.

Paula Pereira said...

Thank you for visiting my blog and for all the kind words! I really like your blog and will defintley be visiting it reguraly.

Matt's Kitchen said...

These are perfect. They have that Halloweeny look that kids love. What a great Idea to make headstones!

Rebecca of "Ezra Pound Cake" said...

These are cute! Never a need to apologize for being busy. I wait until the last minute, too. ;)

P.S. So glad you mentioned freezing the cookies. Brilliant idea. My ever-growing booty thanks you.

Erin said...

These are so cute!

Teanna DiMicco said...

The dirt is PERFECT! No one else thought of that... and it is brilliant! Nice work!