Caramel Delight Cupcakes + GIVEAWAY!

**** The GIVEAWAY has ended. Stay tuned for another in the near future!****

YAY! Thank you all for your help in reaching 100 likes on Facebook! I appreciate all of you who shared the link with friends and family. To show my appreciation and in honor of the following post, I’ve decided to add to the prize for one lucky Facebook fan. In addition to the four crème brûlée dishes, the palm peeler, and Apple Tarte Tatin recipe card, I’m adding in a box of Caramel Delight Girl Scout Cookies! So, have you liked MB&B’s Facebook page, yet? Winner will be announced on Monday. Keep spreading the word!

You know you want to win this!

One of the best feelings on any workday that’s not a Friday is coming into to work and seeing some homemade sweets brought in by one of your coworkers. Immediately you have to resist the urge to eat the whole bunch then the next thought to clear is if it is an acceptable hour for something like a cupcake. (Answer: If it is after 9 am… on the east coast, then yes. Yes, it is acceptable.) So in honor of dessert week, I asked Steph, my old coworker and resident baker at the office, to guest blog. Also, she has a blog with lots of goodies and sweets already posted! Check it out: Wandering

Caramel Delight Cupcakes (Girl Scout Cookie Inspired)

It’s finally Girl Scout cookie season again (my favorite season!), so when Vicki asked if I wanted to do a guest post on her blog, I immediately started thinking of what Girl Scout cookie related recipe I could make. I decided on a cupcake version of one of my favorite Girl Scout cookies, Caramel Delights (or Samoas as we call them in Ohio!). Fun fact: Caramel Delights are the 2^nd best-selling Girl Scout Cookies (Thin Mints rank 1^st).

These cupcakes are a bit labor-intensive, but at the end, I’ll give you some suggestions on shortcuts 🙂

Ingredients

Cupcake Ingredients
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 cup granulated white sugar
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup hot water
1/2 cup vegetable or canola oil
1 large egg
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Frosting goodness

Filling Ingredients
Coconut pudding mix
2 cups milk
Caramel sauce

Frosting Ingredients
3 cups confectioners’ sugar
1 cup butter (2 sticks)
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 to 2 tablespoons milk or cream

To make the cupcakes:

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Line a cupcake pan with 12 liners. Combine the flour, cocoa, sugar, baking soda and salt. Add the water, oil, egg and vanilla.

Mix well, scraping down the sides as needed until batter is smooth. Pour batter into cupcake liners and bake! Bake the cupcakes for 18-20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cupcake comes out fairly clean. Cool the cupcakes completely before adding the filling or frosting.

Cored Cupcake

To make the filling:

Follow the directions on the box to make the pudding – combine mix with 2 cups cold milk and whisk for 2 minutes. Allow to set for 3 more minutes. If the cupcakes aren’t cool, now is a great time to set aside the pudding and do some dishes. Or go watch TV. Whatever.

When the cupcakes are completely cool, you need to hollow out the centers. There’s a variety of ways you can do this. I have a fancy cupcake-coring tool, but that’s because I’m obsessed with cupcakes. If you’re not crazy like me, all you need is a knife and a spoon. Cut a cone out of the center of each cupcake. Make sure the knife goes almost to the bottom of the cupcake when cutting the cone, for maximum filling. If you want, you can also slice off the bottom of the cone so you have a flat top left to put back on the cupcake and cover the area you filled. I usually skip this step and just let the frosting cover it.

Filled cupcake!

Once each cupcake has a nice hollow center, pour some caramel sauce into the bottom of each cupcake, and then add a dollop of coconut pudding to fill each cupcake. You’re going to have a ton of pudding left over. Sorry. Deal with it – the cupcakes are worth it!

Now we’re ready to frost and decorate, by far my favorite step!

To make the frosting:

In a standing mixer fitted with a whisk, mix together sugar and butter. Mix on low speed until well blended and then increase speed to medium and beat for another 3 minutes.

Add vanilla and milk and continue to beat on medium speed for 1 minute more, adding more milk if needed for spreading consistency.

After frosting all the cupcakes, carefully spoon toasted coconut onto each cupcake, patting it down a little so the coconut sticks to the frosting. Then drizzle the caramel sauce across each cupcake, following it with drizzled chocolate sauce (made by melting chocolate chips, but you could just buy chocolate syrup, too).

Isn’t this just calling your name?!

Shortcuts:

1. Who really has time to make cupcakes from scratch? That’s why the Pillsbury Doughboy invented boxed cake mixes! Grab your favorite cake mix and get baking!

2. Pre-made frosting. Still delicious, and you can eat the leftovers out of the can for the rest of the week. What could be better?

3. Skip the filling part and just decorate them all fancy. Super impressive and you don’t have to tell anyone they were supposed to have filling!

-Steph