I owe everything about these cupcakes to the Brown Eyed Baker. Almost..(more on that later).
Back to the cupcakes…AND THE ICING. Who doesn’t like good icing? Even the proudest among us will, under pressure, admit to licking the icing bowl. AS AN ADULT.
Michelle at BEB claims that her’s is the Best Chocolate Buttercream around — a lofty claim to be sure — and one she’s on solid ground making. This light, sweet and creamy stuff will have you hiding in the broom closet, with the bowl ALL TO YOURSELF.
The cupcakes are where my almost comes in. I started with BEB’s Mocha Cupcakes, but as I was gathering the ingredients, my little eye spied the jar of Homemade Coffee Extract on the shelf. It makes the best Irish Coffees, hot toddies, Coffee Ice Cream, milkshakes and glaze for a Tiramisu Cheesecake.
It now also makes excellent cupcakes — I substituted 1/2 cup of this extract for all of the hot coffee and granulated sugar in BEB’s recipe. Everything else was exactly the same. The finished deal was light, moist with a light mocha flavour — an excellent chocolate buttercream delivery device. Because isn’t that what cupcakes are, really?
Now those are some gorgeous cupcakes. I just love mocha. I think I shall try your homemade coffee extract!
Thanks so much for stopping by!
Hi Theresa – thanks for stopping by my blog and checking out my latest post :)
These cupcakes are gorgeous. I love the idea of home made coffee extract, being the all round coffee fiend that I am. Great job on reintepreting Michelle’s recipe :)
What is it about coffee and chocolate?! It’s pretty unbeatable.
These look great, and of course i had to visit the coffee extract recipe. I am not a fan of sugar in my coffee drinks, so for my own version, I just use a very concentrated, cold-brewed coffee.
Great tip — thanks Janice!
Beautiful cupcakes.
Awesome looking cupcakes!! I love things that are flavored with mocha
Mocha with chocolate is one of my favourites…
Yum. That looks so good on a dreary, overcast day. I live in MI, what can I say? :-P I think I need to make something sweet now. Thanks for the encouragement!
wish i had one of this cupcakes right now..they look so good!!
That sounds so delicious! Nothing like a good cupcake!
Beautiful cupcakes and they sound delicious with your change in the mocha icing/frosting. I don’t think I’ve seen more perfect piping on a cupcake. Nicely done! :)
That’s so funny – I recently spied some coffee extract in a cooking store and I was SO tempted to buy it but I didn’t what I’d do with it!! I wish I had, this is fab.
Trix,
I just reposted the coffee extract recipe http://islandvittles.com/2010/11/08/coffee-extract/ — I know you’re a tad busy with culinary school and food editor job, but this is so worth it!
OMG, your icing swirls look like my favorite soft serve ice cream! LOVE! So happy you adored the icing!
Thanks again for the recipe, Michelle…lovers of icing, unite!
Hello,
I would love the recipe for your mocha cupcakes with buttercream icing, but the recipe doesn’t show up here on your website. Any chance of getting that recipe up on your website? It sounds delicious :) thanks, Julia
Julia, the recipes for both the butter cream and the cupcakes are from the browneyedbaker.com…buttercream here: http://www.browneyedbaker.com/2010/10/22/best-chocolate-buttercream-cupcakes/ and the cupcakes here: http://www.browneyedbaker.com/2010/08/13/mocha-cupcakes-with-espresso-buttercream-frosting/.
I substituted my coffee extract (http://wp.me/p10Y0w-rw) for the hot coffee and sugar listed in the cupcake recipe…Theresa