Peanut Butter Cup Cupcakes

Attention Reese's lovers!!!! You are about to fall in love...with a cupcake. We decided to throw a birthday extravaganza at work a few weeks back. We had a bunch of b-days close to each other so we threw one mini party, instead of multiple. We looked through all the recipes we could find with candy in them, and they all agreed on these ones. They all love Peanut Butter! I am not a die hard fan, but even these won me over.
Lets get started!

Cupcakes
1 (18.25 oz) package devil's food cake
1 (3.4 oz) package instant chocolate pudding mix
1 cup sour cream
1 cup vegetable oil
4 eggs
2 tsp pure vanilla extract
1 tbsp instant espresso granules (dissolve it in a 1/2 cup warm water)
30 Reese's mini peanut butter cups, frozen (make sure you freeze for at least three hours,)
Reese's peices if you like them.
cupcake liners

Peanut Butter Butter cream icing
3 sticks unsalted butter (softened)
1 cup creamy peanut butter
2 tbsp pure vanilla extract
2 lbs (that's right) powdered sugar
3-4 tbsp low fat milk
Reese's peanut cup minis

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Place your cupcake liners in your pan.
In a large mixing bowl with a hand mixer, or your stand mixer bowl using the paddle attachment, mix together all of your ingredients, except the peanut butter cups for minute or two until well mixed.
Side Note: I didn't use Espresso Beans. I wasn't actually sure who at work did. Instead I used hot chocolate mix. I used the same amount, then microwaved it so it was nice and hot. Make sure it is well mixed if you do this. Then pour it into your batter.

 This was before the hot chocolate.

 This was after the hot chocolate.

 Fill your cupcake batter about 2/3 full.

 Get your cups out of the freezer. I left the wrappers on. I didn't want them to freeze together.

Take one cup and push it down about halfway into your filling. Place in the oven for 18-22 minutes. Make sure when you place a toothpick in the middle, that you don't hit the cup.

 Place them on a cooling rack when done. Start your frosting at this time.
Take your Peanut Butter and soft butter, and mix them on low to medium speed.

 Slowly add in the powdered sugar in small doses. As always, I recommend covering the blender with a towel just in case. Just don't catch the towel in the mixer.

Add your vanilla, and your milk in small doses, while blending on low speed. Add milk until it is the desired thinness.  Keep blending for about 5-7 minutes until nice and fluffy.  It should look like this when it is done.

 I placed mine in a bag, then cut out a small opening in the corner. Easier clean up that way.

 Here are the cupcakes fresh out of the oven.

 Make sure you fill up the hole with frosting before topping the rest. I found out very quickly that the rest of the frosting sinks, so it messes up your swirl.
Tada!!!

 So yummy!

Recipe courtesy of The Little Kitchen
Enjoy!!!

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Cupcakes with Cookie Dough Buttercream Frosting

Hi there all my Connor friends!  Once again, I have been slacking on my blog. I know I know! I don't know why I do it. It's not that I'm not baking, it's just once I bake, I have no time to sit and type it all out. It's a sad state of affairs. Don't worry though, I'm back, and hopefully I will have a lot to blog about. First let's start with these little bites of heaven. I saw this recipe a few months back on  Kevin and Amanda's site. She is... I want to say awesome. Is there a word better than Awesome? Whatever that word is, she is it.  I saw these cupcakes awhile back, but was terrified of the ingredients. It's not that there are a lot, it's that, there is a lot of butter. We recently went on a healthy eating kick, and we lost weight. So, if we are going to eat something with a bucket a butter, now was a good time. We deserve it, right?

For the cookie dough:
2 sticks softened butter
3/4 cup sugar
3/4 cup brown sugar
4 tbsp milk
1 tbsp vanilla
2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1/4 tsp. salt
1 cup mini chocolate chips

For the cupcakes:
3 sticks softened butter
1 1/2 cups light brown sugar, packed
4 large eggs
2 2/3 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt
1 cup milk
2 tsp. vanilla extract

For the frosting:
3 sticks softened butter
3/4 cup light brown sugar, packed
3 1/2 cups powdered sugar
1/2 tsp. salt
2 tbsp. milk
1 tsp. vanilla extract

Let's start!

Cookie Dough Recipe:
 Combine the butter and sugars in a mixing bowl and cream on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes.

 Beat in milk and vanilla until incorporated and smooth.

 Beat in the flour and salt until just combined.

 Stir in the chocolate chips.

 Your dough should look like this.

 Using a 1.5 tbsp scoop, shape the dough into balls or tubes. The directions say to freeze on a parchment lined baking sheet overnight. I didn't have that time, so I froze it for about three hours. They were fine.

  Cupcake Recipe:
 Preheat the oven to 350° F. Line two cupcake pans with paper liners. I was able to make 30 cupcakes out of it, so depending on how much you fill them, you may get more.  

 In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, combine the butter and brown sugar.

 Beat together on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes.

Mix in the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition and scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed.
Combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a medium bowl. Stir together to blend. Add the dry ingredients to the mixer bowl on low speed, alternating with the milk, beginning and ending with the dry ingredients, mixing each addition just until incorporated. Blend in the vanilla.

  Using a 3 tbsp scoop, fill the prepared cupcake liners 2/3 full with the cupcake batter.

 Place a frozen cookie dough ball on the top center of each cupcake.
Side note: As I was filling my cupcakes, I stopped. "Wait, these dough balls don't have any eggs in them, sweeett!" That's right, eat away. I will also mention that I had 30 cupcakes, and about 50 dough balls. I brought the cupcakes and dough balls to work, no one had a problem eating either of them!

  Bake at 350 for 16-18 minutes. When they come out, they are like cupcakes with cookies baked in. It's a nice little surprise when you bite into it!

Frosting:

Combine the butter and brown sugar in a mixing bowl and cream on medium-high speed until light and fluffy. Beat in the powdered sugar until smooth. Beat in the salt, milk, and vanilla extract until smooth and combined.

 Here is your finished cupcake. I didn't have a lot of time to decorate them as pretty as Amanda did, but my co-workers didn't complain. Enjoy them! They are yummy!

Enjoy!
Courtesy of Kevin and Amanda.

Snickerdoodle Muffins

We decided to go on a diet, well, not so much a diet, but a healthy food kick a few months back. We have been doing very well. On occasion, we may or may not have a bad day. On these "bad days," we may, or may not, bake a bunch of not healthy things. Haha. This weeks bad day item, was Snickerdoodle Muffins. Craig has been on a snickerdoodle kick these last two weeks! He already made two batches of Snickerdoodle cookies last week. So, it's official, we are bad dieters! It's also official that my hubby is addicted to StumbleUpon, and I could not be more proud! Here is the Muffin recipe that he found while stumbling late the other night.

Snickerdoodle Muffins

2 cups flour

1/2 tsp. salt

2 tsp. cream of tartar

1 tsp. baking soda

1 stick butter, softened

3/4 cup sugar

2 eggs

1 cup milk

1 1/2 tsp. vanilla

1 Tbs. sugar + 1 tsp. cinnamon for topping

We've never made muffins before, so we were surprised at how well these came out. They weren't very hard to make either.

In a bowl, stir together the flour, salt, cream of tartar and baking soda.

 In a mixer bowl, cream the butter and sugar. Then, you can add the eggs.

  Add the milk and vanilla and mix until well combined.

 We were kind of unsure about this part, because our mixture looked like cottage cheese. It was chunky, and had a lot of liquid in it. Don't worry, it is okay.

Stir the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients, just until moistened. The first batch we made was plain.  However, the second batch had Cinnamon and Sugar mixed in with the batter. It gave it a little more kick on the inside.

 Fill muffin cups 2/3 of the way full of batter.

  Sprinkle with cinnamon sugar.  We made it so the top was full.

Almost done...

 These are the finished sprinkled muffins before going in the oven.

 Bake at 400 degrees for 15-20 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean.

 I ate these for breakfast every day for like a week.

 Did mention, I really..really.. like butter....

Courtesy of Eat at Home

Summer Fruit Cone!

It is so hot already here in Florida, and it is only June! I am not looking forward to August at all! I would love to sit in, or near the freezer and eat a bucket of ice cream to cool me down. That is not going to happen though, because I am eating healthy right now. Bummer, I know. That is why you haven't been seeing a lot of goodies on here lately. Don't worry, I'm not that strong willed that I can give it up all together. You will see some some, and oh boy, I am excited about them. In the meantime though, I have a healthy fave that is great for summer. This consists of a bunch of fruit/and or berries. You can use whatever ones you want. These are the ones that I use.

Blender
Waffle Cone
Blueberries
Strawberries
Raspberries
Kiwi
Grapes
Green or Red Apple
Yogurt (You can use any kind that you want, but I am using the Greek stuff, because it's healthy.)

First things first, you are going to blend up all of your fruit and berries.  Easy peasy.

 This is your finished blended product. You will have more than you need. I just put it in the fridge for later.

 Next, take a scoop of yogurt. I added in a little but more for this pic because I was making two. If you use to much it will be watery. Do a spoonful at a time.

 This is what I meant by watery, just add more of your blended mix to it.

Put your berries into a waffle cone and presto! Here is your cool summer treat! It is so good, and it isn't a lot of sugar. If you crave chocolate, you can add a little pinch of cocoa powder to it. It is only 10 calories more!

Enjoy!!!