Valentine Cupcakes

These were amazing. I revisited a frosting recipe that I haven’t used in a few years. I forgot how completely heavenly it is, and you really must make it.  But before I get to that recipe, let’s talk about the cake. I told you in my last cupcake posts that what I usually do for my cakes is use Betty Crocker cake mix, but I substitute buttermilk for the water, and add flavorings. This time I used a new cake mix. I buy a lot of my supplies for resale from CK Products, and recently they added some “Premium Cake Mixes” to their line of products.

I bought a few with my last order to try them out. I was a little skeptical, because they seemed exactly like any other store-bought cake mix that I’ve ever bought. You add the exact same ingredients (3 eggs, 1 1/4 cups water, 1/3 cup oil), and I figured it’s probably more of the same, just repackaged and re-branded. Well I have to tell you, I am pleasantly surprised. I’ve made the chocolate and the yellow so far, and mixed exactly as directed on the bag, and they really are something special. I don’t sell them in my store yet– I’m not sure if there’s enough interest among cookie decorators, but you can get them at Country Kitchen. They’re more expensive than regular cake mix, plus you’ll probably have to pay some shipping, but I think its worth the extra money. Let me know if it’s something you’d like to see in my store, too.

Anyway, back to the frosting. This is a super simple chocolate whipped cream recipe that is so very delicious. I found the recipe years ago in this book:

I think it might actually be the frosting that’s on the cover cake. It only has 3 ingredients:

2 cups heavy whipping cream

1/2 cup granulated sugar (superfine is great for this)

1/3 cup cocoa

I really really love this with Dutch Process Cocoa. I think it is significantly better than regular cocoa. Unfortunately, Dutch Process Cocoa can be kind of hard to find, and I’m having a tough time finding it in my town. I did find this:

Which is a mixture of regular and Dutched. It was a good substitute. But if you can get pure Dutch, try it! It is so delicious.

What you’ll do is pour the whipping cream in a bowl (metal is the best).

Add the sugar

And the cocoa

Stir around with the beaters (they don’t have to be connected to the mixer yet) until everything is nicely combined.

It doesn’t have to be perfectly smooth– just so all the dry ingredients get mixed in. Refrigerate the mixture (along with the beaters) for at least 15 minutes.  After 15 minutes, get it out of the fridge and beat until thick and creamy and stiff peaks form.

Oh man, this is so good! It tastes like chocolate ice cream, only a lot less cold. You really don’t want to under-beat this, so take it pretty far with the whipping. If you under-beat, it will soften up and break down. If you take it farther and make sure it’s really good and stiff, it has remarkable stability.  In fact, I accidentally left a small bowl of this on the counter last night, and when I got up this morning it was still holding strong, and hadn’t watered out. That was 10+ hours at room temperature. You don’t want to do that on purpose– definitely refrigerate this, but just as a point of interest…. 🙂

Anyway, then you can use a decorating bag and large tip to pipe the frosting onto the cupcakes. I used a 1M tip here, but if you want a round swirl, you could use a 1A or a 2A.

Yum. I wish these weren’t all gone.

I sprinkled half with mini hearts sprinkles (which I LOVE. Aren’t they the cutest?), and half with red non pareils. They were super cute all together on my cake stand.

When I got these all together for a picture, I really wished I had a party going on because they look so fun and Valentine-party-like. But we just ate them instead.

Oh, and I baked these in the red gingham baking cups, but because this was such a dark chocolate cake, it made the cups harder to see after baking. So I slipped them into a second cup because I thought they were so cute and wanted them to show up better.

I gave some to my friend in this cute box

Isn’t that fun? Mmm… cupcakes make me happy lately.