The cupcake craze is still in full swing in Palo Alto, where we can choose from Sprinkle’s or Kara’s Cupcakes (which originated in San Francisco).  I’ve been pleasantly surprised with the quality of the cake from Sprinkle’s on the couple of time I’ve tasted them.  I finally decided to try out Kara’s a couple weekends ago — after hiking up Half Dome the day before, I felt like I could afford a little treat.  While picking a cupcake may sometimes be a difficult decision, this time it was easy.  Fleur de Sel cupcake — “chocolate cupcake with caramel filling, ganache frosting and fleur de sel.”  Killer combination!  And while it was indeed a wonderful melding of flavors, with the sweet caramel, the rich chocolate, and the salt to cut through it all, the cake itself was disappointingly dry.  Honestly, I felt like I could do better.  So, the next weekend, if I do say so myself, I did.

I made the devil’s food cake recipe my grandmother used to use, adding a bit of extra chocolate, and topped it with a very dark chocolatey buttercream adapted from Mark Bittman.  I based the caramel on a recipe from — you guessed it! — Smitten Kitchen.  This was definitely the best caramel I have ever made in terms of cooking it the right amount of time (a feat I’m sure I will never repeat), but it was a bit runny for the filling, so I need to work on that.  Despite being a bit messy from the runny caramel, the flavor of these cupcakes was a hit, and I’m sure I’ll be making them again.

And finally, a word of warning. If you have extra chocolate frosting and caramel filling at the end, by no means should you alternate dipping a (clean) finger in each one and licking it off until you run out of fingers. If you start doing that, you may never stop. Not that I would know.

Fleur de Sel Cupcakes

Inspired by Kara’s Cupcakes

24 devil’s food cupcakes (see below)
1 recipe chocolate buttercream (see below)
1 recipe caramel filling (see below)
fleur de sel or other flaky sea salt

In order to get a bunch of filling in the middle, I cut the tops off and filled them that way. You can also inject the filling, but I think it’s hard to get as much in that way. To fill by cutting off the tops: cut a cone out of the top of the cupcake at about a 45 degree angle. Cut most of the pointed end off of the cone (oooh look — a snack!). Pipe filling in the remaining hole and put the top back on.

Top with chocolate buttercream frosting. Sprinkle lightly with fleur de sel. They keep fine at least overnight in the fridge (covered).

Devil’s Food Cake

Adapted from Mrs. Fred Reed’s recipe in the Friedland Cookbook

1/2 lb (2 sticks) butter
1 1/4 c sugar
2 eggs
1 c buttermilk
2 t baking soda
2 1/2 c flour
2 t vanilla
2 oz chocolate

Preheat oven to 400 F.

Cream the butter and sugar. Add eggs one at a time. (Don’t overbeat here, or, as I found, your cake will probably fall. At least I think that’s why it fell. It’ll still taste good though.)

Dissolve soda in the buttermilk. Alternate additions of flour and buttermilk, beginning and ending with flour. Melt the chocolate and stir into the batter.

Pour into cupcake wrappers and bake at 400 F for 20 minutes. Makes about 2 dozen cupcakes (or 3 9″ layers or 1 quarter sheet cake).

Chocolate Buttercream

Adapted from How to Cook Everything by Mark Bittman

1 stick butter
1 t vanilla
1/4 t salt
4 c powdered sugar
1 c cocoa
1/3 c cream or milk (plus more if needed)

Cream the butter in an electric mixer. Cream in vanilla and salt. Cream in the sugar and cocoa a little at a time. (I know it sounds like a lot of cocoa but trust me — you want to.) Stir in the milk, a little at a time, until it’s the right consistency.

Salted Caramel Filling

Adapted from the Smitten Kitchen.

1 c sugar
1/2 c water
6 T butter
1/2 c milk or cream (I used milk; I’m hoping cream will help thicken up the filling a bit next time)

Mix sugar and water in a large saucepan over medium to medium high heat. Once sugar has dissolved, stop stirring. Continue to cook until it’s amber-colored. I actually have found that’s it’s easier to pay attention to smell than color (partly because all of my pots have black bottoms). If it smells like caramel it’s good. Note that this may take fifteen minutes or so, but once it gets close, watch it carefully as it can go from underdone to burned in no time, and there’s nothing to do with burned caramel but start over. Once it’s colored to your nose’s liking, stir in the butter. (The sauce will foam up.) Then stir in the cream and stir it until smooth. Cool completely before using to fill cupcakes. Extra sauce keeps for a while in the fridge (not that it will be there long).

Growing up I often asked for a Red Velvet cake for my birthday. One year I remember mom making a version with pepperming icing, with a recipe I think came from Southern Living. I decided to try something like that on my birthday this year, but in miniature form. I made these cupcakes for the “Biochemistry Bake-Off” at work. I didn’t win anything, but I still had fun making them and they turned out pretty well — or at least half of them did. I baked half of them in new silicone muffin tins, and those collapsed to about half the size and pulled away from the edges as soon as I took them out of the oven. So I’m not using silicone muffin tins again! The other ones turned out pretty nicely though. I made a peppermint cream cheese frosting and garnished some of them with grated chocolate and crushed candy canes, and the others with a little bit of chopped peppermint bark I still had left from earlier in the week.

Red Velvet Cake:

1 c butter (softened)
2 c sugar
2 eggs (room temperature)
1 T cocoa
1 T vinegar
2 1/2 c cake flour
1/2 t salt
1/2 t baking soda
1 c buttermilk
1 t vanilla
1 oz red food coloring

1. Cream butter and sugar.
2. Add eggs and beat until fluffy.
3. Add cocoa to vinegar, and add to creamed mixture.
4. Sift remaining dry ingredients and gradually add to batter.
5. Add buttermilk, vanilla, and food coloring.
6. Bake in cupcake wrappers (makes a little more than 2 dozen) or bake in three greased and floured 9″ round cake pans, either way at 350 F for 25 minutes.
7. Let cool completely before icing.

Peppermint Cream Cheese Frosting:

1/2 package of cream cheese (4 oz) (softened)
1/2 cup butter (softened)
1 1-lb. box of powdered sugar
1 t peppermint extract

1. Beat cream cheese and butter.
2. Gradually add sugar, beating until smooth.
3. Add extract and beat until blended.

Ice cupcakes with the peppermint cream cheese frosting. Garnish with grated chocolate and crushed peppermint candy canes, if desired.