+For the past year and a half, it has become customary for me to bake cupcakes for every holiday, birthday, and occasional TV show season premiere (True Blood anyone???) to share with my coworkers, which is how this recipe came to life. It's my supervisor Rocco's birthday tomorrow and he LOVES Milkyways. He asked if I could make a milkyway themed cupcake....at which I heartily chuckled and said "ummm this is ME you're talking to...I'm pretty sure I can make this work!" I searched high and low for a recipe that didn't involve shoving a bite sized milkyway into the center of the cupcake and came across this one!! So without further adieu....THE CUPCAKES!!
Cake Ingredients:
3 Full sized Milkyway bars, and an extra one if you want to use it for decoration
1 3/4 cups milk, plus 2 tbsp to use when melting the candy bars
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa
2 cups flour
1Tbsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1 stick room temp butter
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla
2 eggs
Frosting Ingredients:
25 caramels (the chewy square kind)
1/4 cup milk
1 stick room temp butter
2 1/2 cups sifted powder sugar
1/4 tsp vanilla
HOW DO I DO IT???
1. Preheat your oven to 350 and get your cupcake pans ready with the cutest cupcake liners you can find!
2. In a medium saucepan (I used a frying pan and just kept it all on one side) melt the 3 Milkyway bars with 2 Tbsp of milk. Stir until smooth and creamy. Pour the melty milkyway mixture into a bowl and let cool off for at least 10 minutes.
3. In a medium bowl, mix the cocoa, flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt gently and set aside for later.
4. In a larger bowl cream the butter, sugar, brown sugar, and vanilla until smooth.
5. Add eggs one at a time, make sure to scrape the edges of the bowl in between!
6. Add the milkyway mixture and mix on high for 30 seconds (time it! or count lol)
7. Add 1/2 of the flour mixture and 1/2 of the milk to the butter mixture and mix well until smooth. Scrape down the sides of the bowl every once in a while and then add the rest of the flour mix and the rest of the milk. Mix again until smooth.
8. Spoon your newly made cake mix into those pretty cupcake liners! Fill them about 3/4 of the way (about one big spoonful each)
9. Bake 20-23 minutes or until a toothpick put into the middle comes out clean.
10. When the cupcakes are down cool them in the pan for about 10 minutes and then let them finish cooling on a wire rack.
Frosting?? WHAT DO I DO??
1. In another medium saucepan (or frying pan) melt the caramels over low heat stirring often. Take the pan off the heat and add the milk, stirring until smooth. Poor into a bowl and allow to cool to room temp.
2. In a medium bowl cream together the butter, powdered sugar, and vanilla for 3 minutes on high (time it!!!)
3. Add the room temp caramel and mix for 2 minutes on high (time it!!)
Well that's it!! Frost those babies!
Some tips when making these:
1. Make sure your butter is room temp! It really does make a difference, especially with the buttercream.
2. Make sure the caramels are completely melted and liquidy...if you half ass melt them they will glob up when you add the milk (yea...i did that). If this happens, put it back in the saucepan and put it on low heat, stirring often until the mixture is completely smooth.
3. DO NOT ADD THE CARAMEL MIXTURE TO THE BUTTERCREAM HOT!! It HAS to be room temp, if its even a little bit warm it will RUIN the buttercream! Don't make this mistake!
4. About cooking times...the original recipe I used for this said to cook them 28-30 minutes. The first dozen I cooked for 28 minutes and they came out dry as a bone. The second batch I cooked for 23 minutes and they came out better, but not perfect. The third batch I cooked for 20 minutes and they came out perfect! Play around with times until you find one that works for you. Remember if you are using dark coated pans or dark/thick cupcake liners your cupcakes will cook faster, so you should reduce your cooking time. If you pull them out and they aren't done yet, put them back in for 1-2 minute increments until done. Don't walk away! Cupcakes aren't a set it and forget it kinda deal :)
Here are a couple of pictures of the finished product!! The icing is really a light caramel color but my phone couldn't quite capture that, so keep that in mind :)
Some of my "Fancy" icing work, I'm still new to this!
A couple more :)
Well, that's it for now Carnivores!! I hope you enjoy this recipe as much as I now do! I'll let ya know in my next post how Rocco and the rest of my coworkers liked them :) If you have questions about the recipe or anything else leave me a comment, I'll be sure to get back to you.
Stay Hungry Carnivores!!
Yum! I've been waiting for this recipe, thanks :D
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