This week my husband asked if I could make some Chocolate Peppermint Cupcakes for him to bring into work. My husband’s co-workers are often the recipients of my baking trials and triumphs, and always seem more than happy to eat my “experiments”. My husband doesn’t often put in special requests, so I was glad to cater to him and sent him to work today with a dozen Chocolate Peppermint Cupcakes. My husband’s work shift starts at 6am and he called me later in the morning to let me know the cupcake were gone by about 6:10am! I guess that means they liked them =)
The recipe is just a tiny variation of the Chocolate Cupcake and Cream Cheese Frosting recipes I’ve posted before, but I’ll add them here to save you a couple clicks.
Perfect Chocolate Cupcakes
(makes 24-27 standard sized cupcakes)
2 cups sugar
1 3/4 cups all purpose flour
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa (best quality available)
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1 cup whole milk
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 teaspoons vanilla extract (best quality available)
1 cup boiling water
~ Directions ~
*Line muffin tin with paper liners. Heat oven to 350*F.
*In a large mixing bowl, stir together sugar, flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
*Add eggs, milk, oil and vanilla. Beat on medium speed for one minute.
*Stir in boiling water (the batter will be thin, don’t worry, this is right).
*Fill liners 2/3 full with batter. (I usually put the batter into a large measuring cup with a pour spout, and then pour the batter into the liners.)
*Bake cupcakes for approximately 22-24 minutes.
*Cool completely on wire rack before frosting.
Peppermint Cream Cheese Frosting
1/2 cup (1 stick, 8 Tablespoons) butter, at room temperature
6 oz. cream cheese, at room temperature (about 3/4 of a regular block of cream cheese)
4 cups powdered confectioners sugar
1 teaspoon pure peppermint extract
1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1 to 3 Tablespoons heavy cream, heavy whipping cream (or milk- although I do like the richness that cream adds)
~ Directions ~
*Place butter in a large mixing bowl and blend slightly. Add cream cheese and blend until combined, about 30 seconds.
*Add powdered sugar (a little at a time) and blend on low speed until combined. Increase to medium speed and beat until it begins to get fluffy.
*Add vanilla and peppermint extracts
*Slowly add the heavy cream, a little bit at a time until desired consistency is met. (Don’t add too much if you want the frosting to stay in place when piped on cupcakes.)
*Beat until fluffy, about 1 minute.
*Use at once or keep refrigerated. (This frosting will keep well in the refrigerator for several days, but you may need to re-beat it for the best texture.)
To achieve the red stripe in the frosting: Before filling a large piping bag with frosting, add some red gel food coloring to a toothpick, and draw two (vertical) lines with the red dye on the inside of the piping bag. Then carefully fill the piping bag with frosting. Squeeze some frosting into a bowl until you begin to see the red stripe, then frost the cupcakes.
Top cupcakes with some crushed candy canes (they will “melt” after a bit, so they need to be served right away) or a small piece of peppermint bark (I used a little peppermint Andes candy).
Bring some of these into work, or send them in with your spouse, and see how popular you quickly become!
Happy Baking!
How to Make Chocolate Peppermint Cupcakes
Chocolate Peppermint Cupcakes
Ingredients
Perfect Chocolate Cupcakes
- 2 cups sugar
- 1 3/4 cups all purpose flour
- 3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa best quality available
- 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 2 eggs
- 1 cup whole milk
- 1/2 cup vegetable oil
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract best quality available
- 1 cup boiling water
Peppermint Cream Cheese Frosting
- 1/2 cup butter 1 stick/8 Tablespoons, at room temperature
- 6 oz cream cheese at room temperature (about 3/4 of a regular block of cream cheese)
- 4 cups powdered confectioners sugar
- 1 teaspoon pure peppermint extract
- 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
- 1 to 3 tablespoons heavy cream heavy whipping cream (or milk- although I do like the richness that cream adds)
Instructions
Perfect Chocolate Cupcakes
- Line muffin tin with paper liners. Heat oven to 350*F.
- In a large mixing bowl, stir together sugar, flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
- Add eggs, milk, oil and vanilla. Beat on medium speed for one minute.
- Stir in boiling water (the batter will be thin, don’t worry, this is right).
- Fill liners 2/3 full with batter. (I usually put the batter into a large measuring cup with a pour spout, and then pour the batter into the liners.)
- Bake cupcakes for approximately 22-24 minutes.
- Cool completely on wire rack before frosting.
Peppermint Cream Cheese Frosting
- Place butter in a large mixing bowl and blend slightly. Add cream cheese and blend until combined, about 30 seconds.
- Add powdered sugar (a little at a time) and blend on low speed until combined. Increase to medium speed and beat until it begins to get fluffy.
- Add vanilla and peppermint extracts
- Slowly add the heavy cream, a little bit at a time until desired consistency is met. (Don’t add too much if you want the frosting to stay in place when piped on cupcakes.)
- Beat until fluffy, about 1 minute.
- Use at once or keep refrigerated. (This frosting will keep well in the refrigerator for several days, but you may need to re-beat it for the best texture.)
To achieve the red stripe in the frosting
- Before filling a large piping bag with frosting, add some red gel food coloring to a toothpick, and draw two (vertical) lines with the red dye on the inside of the piping bag. Then carefully fill the piping bag with frosting.
- Squeeze some frosting into a bowl until you begin to see the red stripe, then frost the cupcakes.
- Top cupcakes with some crushed candy canes (they will “melt” after a bit, so they need to be served right away) or a small piece of peppermint bark (I used a little peppermint Andes candy).
Tried this recipe weeekend just gone but did it with a green colouring. They were deliciious and now have had several requests to make more. Yummy!!!! Yummy!!!!!
Hi, Glory:
Have you ever frozen this icing? I want to make the Hi Hat Cupcakes (as seen on Bakerella.com) but want to use creamcheese icing instead of marshmellow meringue (not a fan of marshmellow and especially not of meringue!). I’m assuming that, if the frosting is frozen before being dipped in the warm chocolate, it won’t totally melt. Before I try this, however, I’m wondering if the creamcheese would freeze and hold it’s piped shape. Any insights is greatly appreciated! Thanks!
I have just finished making these and they are the bomb! I have been trying to master cupcakes for a while (try years) and have tried many many recipes…. But these are delicious! Thank you for giving my confidence a nice big boost, I now don’t feel so ashamed to serve cupcakes at family events or my kids birthday parties! I especially love the peppermint cream cheese frosting – my husband loved these and he is not a cupcake fan at all! Thanks again. Also, being in Australia I had to convert most of the measurement to metric and obviously did it right as they turned out ok.
Hello Glorious treats, I’m so in love with your blog and I just discovered it. I just need to ask a question though- will this recipe make a 9″ cake, as i’ve been searching for the perfect chocolate cake recipe.
Thank you xxx love your vanilla cupcake recipe, it’s just perfect!!! Will definitely try this!
Just made these cupcakes- they are delicious! The were pretty easy to make and tasted great! The frosting was extremely light and the cake was sweet, but not too sweet. I had company over and everyone loved them. I decided to try something different and used mint extract in the frosting instead of the peppermint extract, and put crushed peppermints into the frosting. Everyone really loved it, but you have to make sure that the peppermints are extremely crushed up (I used a pan and crushed them with a glass.) Thanks so much for the amazing recipe! We loved it!
I made these a few weeks ago a they were AMAZING! One question though. My brothervin law requests these fo his birthday , except he wants a cake instead off cupcakes. Do I prepare it the same way? And what about make time? Any help would be appreciated! Thank you!
These turned out amazing!! Thanks for the recipe!!
This recipe for chocolate cupcakes was the best I have ever had. Thank you very much!
I tried these last night and they came out soooo awesome and cute! For the icing, I placed my pastry bag into a tall thin glass and folded the bag over the sides of the glass. Then I used a toothpick and gel food coloring to draw 2 lines from the tip to the top. While the bag was still in the glass, I filled it halfway, then then unfolded the rest of the bag and filled the rest. Not sure that that makes sense reading it, but that worked really well for me. They came out perfect!
Yes, that’s exactly the way I do it =) So glad you enjoyed them!
I don’t really understand how you got that frosting to look like that… If you wouldn’t mind going into a bit more detail that would be awesome. I am really looking forward to making these but I would like for the frosting to look just as good!