I love chocolate…
So naturally, when I started experimenting with baking cupcakes from scratch (several years ago) I began a quest for the perfect chocolate cupcakes. I worked through several dozen recipes and of course, didn’t have too much trouble finding people willing to eat my “experiments.”
I finally found a recipe titled Hershey’s “Perfectly Chocolate” Chocolate Cake, hmm, “…Perfectly Chocolate”, sounds about right to me! The first time I made it, I used Hershey’s unsweeted cocoa (as the recipe calls for). They turned out pretty good. The next time I made them, I used Ghirardelli brand unsweetened cocoa, and… perfect! The Ghirardelli brand gave a much deeper chocolate flavor. So I’d highly recomend using either Ghirardelli brand unsweetened cocoa, or the best quality brand you can find. You can really taste the difference. Since discovering this recipe, I’ve made it dozens and dozens of times. And every time, it’s delicious! The cake has a nice light and fluffy texture and a rich chocolate flavor.
Perfectly 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 aproximately 18-22 minutes.
Cool completely on wire rack before frosting.
Recipe source- Hershey’s
Try the recipe HERE for either vanilla or chocolate (my favorite!) cream cheese frosting.
Perfectly Chocolate Cupcakes Recipe
Perfectly Chocolate Cupcakes
Ingredients
- 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
Instructions
- 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 18-22 minutes.
- Cool completely on wire rack before frosting.
Made these! SOO good. love them.
Just a question how do you get the batter to rise evenly and not higher in some ends or pointy? Is it because I maybe be over whipping the batter and it has too much air? How long do you whip up the batter for? or is it that im putting in too much or something. unsure 🙁 tasted wonderful though they just weren’t even.
sad face
Making these for my kids school (120 of them… yikes!) and was so stressed out when my first batch overflowed the cups, then sunk in the middle. The flavor was amazing, but they were a mess. I checked my oven temp, and it was spot on 350. Did some reading, and figured out the problem. My oven seems to lose almost 25 degrees when I open the door, and takes over 10 minutes to recover. 🙁 Upped the temp to close to 400 to preheat, then bumped it down to 375 after I popped them in… 2nd batch in the oven right now, and beautiful little domes. Let’s hope I don’t have the sinking issue either but so far so good. Just wanted to share this in case someone else had similar issues. I’m used to working with thicker batter cupcakes but this recipe cut down on my cost for making so many (oil vs. butter) so I was excited to try it! Thanks for all your tips!
These are delicious, however, my first batch came out sunken in the center and flat tops. I live in Denver, so maybe an altitude problem? I added 2 Tb flour and increased oven temp to 375. They came out much better. Don’t overfill muffin cups more than 2/3 full either. Thanks for the recipe!
Hi there! I found your blog via Pinterest. I’m wanting to try out this recipe and I was wondering what do you consider to be the best quality unsweetened cocoa? I have to admit that I’m usually cheap and buy the generic brand at the store.
thanks!
Hi Glory,
I love all your recipes that I’ve tried and this one is no exception. I want to know if I can use the same recipe to make a whole cake because the batter is very thin. Alternatively, do you have another chocolate cake recipe for a whole cake? Thanks!! 🙂
This recipe works great for cake.
hi just wondering is that fan forced??
thanks 🙂
I’m not sure what you’re asking?
Thank you, thank you, thank you. I followed your instructions precisely and also read your entries on: “How to bake cupcakes” and “How to frost cupcakes”. They came out perfectly and were a hit at friend’s baby shower.
This recipe was absolutely delicious! I would definetly recommend filling the cupcake liners 1/2 of the way full versus 3/4 full. My first batch I filled them 3/4 full and the cupcakes came out HUGE but very tasty. The second batch I filled them 1/2 the way full and they were still on the large side. My cupcakes were done much quicker at 13-15 minutes. Thank you for this delicious recipe that actually yielded more than stated!
I made the chocolate cupcake recipe for Easter this year. The cupcakes were so moist and is the best from scratch cake recipe I have found except for a vegan one I had to use once. The secret is the chocolate , oil and hot water. The cupcakes were even better the next day. They were so yummy. My family loved them. I even got out the decorating equipment and had fun. I am excited that this can be made into a layer cake as well.
Thank you for sharing this recipe. I am excited to try the vanilla ones next time.