Mocha Cupcakes with Espresso Buttercream Frosting

You’ll be happy to know that I have recovered from my epic kitchen fail, the oven is sparkling, and to celebrate I give you these amazing mocha cupcakes with espresso buttercream frosting. Plus, it’s Friday. And cupcakes are a perfect way to welcome the weekend with open arms. It’s been a crazy, messy, stormy week, and you deserve one. I might even go so far as to suggest that you should just skip your morning cup of coffee or trip to Starbucks and have one of these instead. The cupcakes themselves strike a subtle balance between light chocolate and a hint of creamy coffee. Not overwhelming on either end of the spectrum, and the combination results in a smooth, clean flavor, which is perfect for topping with espresso-spiked buttercream. I’ve been trying a new method for making buttercream for cupcakes, and I think you’re going to love it as much as I do. It involves lots of whipping of the butter, and then really whipping the finished buttercream. It gives the frosting a very smooth texture and it melts in your mouth. And as always, I try to achieve at least a 1:1 ratio of frosting to cake when frosting my cupcakes. Frosting is dreamy, yes? I could eat it with a spoon, straight from the mixing bowl.

Now, back to my baking disaster (sort of) for a moment. I wanted to share a recipe resource with all of you in the event that you don’t know about it yet. There is a custom Google search engine called Food Blog Search, built and maintained by Elise from Simply Recipes and Kayln ofKayln’s Kitchen, which pulls search results from over 2,000 hand-selected food blogs. It’s typically my first stop when I’m searching for inspiration for a specific recipe. While I absolutely adore my cookbook collection and find many wonderful recipes among their pages, I know that any recipe I find on a fellow blogger’s site will have been tested and reviewed, with honest feedback. That is invaluable information when undertaking something in the kitchen! Stopping there first instead of my cookbook shelf may have saved me from an oven of overflowing batter. In fact, I think you should bake these cupcakes, then mosy on over to your computer and eat the cupcake while testing out the Food Blog Search.

Mocha Cupcakes

Yield: 12 cupcakes

Prep Time: 15 minutes Baking Time: 17-20 minutes

1-1/3 all-purpose flour
1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
¼ teaspoon salt
½ cup whole milk
½ cup strong brewed coffee
1½ teaspoons espresso powder
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
½ cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, at room temperature
½ cup granulated sugar
½ cup light brown sugar
1 egg, at room temperature

1. Mix the espresso powder into the brewed coffee until dissolved; set aside to cool to room temperature.

2. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line a standard-size muffin tin with paper liners.

3. Whisk together the flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda and salt.

4. Beat the butter and both sugars together on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, about 2-3 minutes. Add the egg and beat until combined. In a measuring cup, combine the milk, brewed coffee mixture and vanilla. Slowly add the flour mixture, alternating with the coffee mixture, ending with the flour mixture.

5. Divide the batter evenly between the 12 liners. Baking for 17-20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center of a cupcake comes out clean. Cool completely before frosting cupcakes.

Espresso Buttercream Frosting

Makes enough to frost 12 cupcakes

1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature
2½ cups powdered sugar
1½ teaspoons vanilla extract
1½ teaspoons espresso powder

1. Mix the espresso powder into the vanilla until dissolved; set aside.

2. Using the whisk attachment of a stand mixer, whip the butter on medium-high speed for 5 minutes, stopping once to scrape the sides of the bowl. Reduce the mixer speed to low and add the powdered sugar a little at a time, waiting until it is mostly incorporated before adding more. Once all of the powdered sugar has been added, scrape the sides of the bowl and increase the speed to medium-high and whip until fluffy, about a minute or two. Add the espresso and vanilla mixture and continue to mix at medium-high until it is completely incorporated, scraping the sides as necessary.

*Note: To make the swirls on the cupcakes, I used a 1M decorating tip.