Salted Caramel Chocolate Cupcakes

Diabeetus

These cupcakes are adapted from the Hummingbird Bakery cookbook and the Preppy Kitchen website. Through some accident, I ended up with three cans of caramel instead of sweetened condensed milk, so I decided to roll with it. What we have here is a chocolate cupcake with a salted caramel filling and salted caramel icing. This recipe makes 24 cupcakes or a 3 layer 8 inch cake.

Salted Caramel Chocolate Cupcakes

Ingredients:

Cake:

3 1/3 cups/400g plain flour

3 1/2 cups/645g caster sugar or granulated sugar

1 3/4 cups/180g cocoa powder

1 Tbsp baking soda

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

4 large eggs

2 tsp vanilla extract

120ml/111g vegetable oil

410ml/420g buttermilk

or the nastiest, wateriest low fat plain yogurt you can find

250ml brewed coffee, cooled

Caramel Filling:

1 1/2 cups/290g caster sugar or granulated sugar

1 Tbsp/35g golden syrup

20ml water

160ml/165g heavy cream or double cream at room temperature

1 tsp salt

80g unsalted butter at room temperature

Caramel Buttercream:

450g unsalted butter at room temperature

295g caramel

this is what I used that tinned caramel for.* You could also reserve this amount of filling

1/2 tsp salt

5 1/2 cups/680g icing sugar

Instructions:

For this cake, it is easiest to begin with the caramel filling because it can cool while you make the cupcakes.

For the Caramel Filling:

In a large saucepan over medium heat, combine the sugar, golden syrup and water

Stirring occasionally, heat until the sugar dissolves and and the liquid is a rich amber colour

Wait for it... wait for it...

Remove caramel from heat and whisking vigorously, pour in the heavy cream slowly

The mixture will puff and up and possibly scatter and it will be a painful, sticky, smelly and humiliating disaster if this is done too quickly.

Return the mixture to medium heat, and bring it to 115˚C/240˚F

This is what it should look like at this point, clearly my thermometer has some water trapped in it and has also fogged up

Pour caramel into a heatproof bowl and stir in the salt

Let cool for a few minutes, then stir in the butter until melted

Cover with cling film/saran wrap directly on top and set aside until ready to use

The cling film/saran wrap on top prevents the caramel from forming a skin

For the Chocolate Cupcakes:

Preheat the oven to 175˚C/350˚F

Line a muffin tin with muffin tin liners

Sift together the flour, cocoa powder, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt into the bowl of a stand mixer, and using a paddle attachment mix on a low speed until blended

As you can see from the first photo, you can set up a sifter on top of the bowl on a scale and save time and hassle

In a separate bowl, whisk together the eggs, vanilla extract, vegetable oil, buttermilk/yogurt and coffee until it is as homogenous as possible

With the mixer running on low, slowly add the wet ingredients to the dry

When no streaks remain, turn up the mixer to medium-high and let it run for 2 minutes or so

As evidenced by the fourth photo, the batter looks pretty gross and lumpy at first. It's all good, it'll smooth out

Scoop the batter into the cupcake cups until they're about 2/3 full

Bake 20-25 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the centre of a cupcake comes out clean

Allow cupcakes to cool in the pan on a wire rack for about 10 minutes

As soon as they're out of the oven, rotate each one. If there is any overspilled batter it is easier to brake it as soon as they're out of the oven before it dries

Remove from pan and allow to cool completely

For the Caramel Buttercream:

In a stand mixer with the paddle attachment, or using a handheld mixer, beat the butter until light and fluffy

Beat in the caramel and salt

Make sure to scrape down the side of the bowl as the butter will cling to it and you'll end up with a situation like the second picture

Sift in the sugar and beat in three additions

The amount of sugar doesn't have to be exact, sweeten to taste

For the Assembly:

Using a small knife, cut a small hole in the top of each cupcake

This is a great way to sample them, because you can eat all the cutaway cake

Using a piping bag, or a plastic bag with a corner snipped off, fill these holes with the homemade caramel

You could also use a teaspoon, it would be fine

Using a piping bag with a circular tip, or an offset spatula, cover the top of the cupcakes in the salted caramel buttercream

This isn't particularly aesthetically pleasing, use any damn piping tip you want

I still had a little bit of the homemade caramel left, so I put a little dollop on top for some halfassed decoration.

These MFs will make your teeth melt down the back of your throat

*This is the caramel can that was accidentally delivered. I did not use the full can in this recipe