Oh my, I adore salted caramel there is just something about that salty sweet goodness that hits just the right spot! I mean look at it! Golden and thick and gooey, mmh... (yes, that spoon did go in my mouth right after that photo was taken)
So, as you can guess, I bought this wonderful pot of deliciousness and decided that the only decent thing to do with it, besides spooning it directly into my mouth, was to make cupcakes with it. I mean cupcakes are awesome, salted caramel is awesome so put them together and you have something extra awesome right? Right!
I searched for some salted caramel cupcake recipes and boy were there many to choose from, should I go with Vanilla or Chocolate? How about double salted caramel? I actually tried out a few cupcake recipes but none seemed to hit the spot. One was a chocolate cupcake made with oil, I learned that I do not like oil in cupcakes they taste weird and have a funny texture, the other was a vanilla cupcake that just seemed to lack that wow factor I was after. Then I remembered these cupcakes from my first post that I adored. They were so chocolatey and rich and fudgy, perfect! They are quickly becoming my go-to chocolate cupcake.
Then onto the frosting, since I was using caramel I didn't really want to use plain old buttercream as it is so very sweet. I noticed that many of the recipes I was browsing used Swiss Meringue Buttercream but that had a heck of a lot of butter, but then I noticed once that had Italian Meringue Buttercream, it seemed much simpler than the Swiss kind, no whipping egg whites over a pan of simmering water.. yay! So I went with Italian.
I am so glad Mr. Grad bought me a Kenwood Stand mixer for my birthday this year, oh boy do I love that machine and that man! I don't think you can really make this kind of frosting without one. It was my first time making this kind of frosting and it is a bit more involved than just whacking sugar and butter in a mixer but I followed this recipe by Annalise and it turned out perfectly. If you are struggling I totally suggest you to check out her step-by-step tutorial. Incidentally today I also learned how to make Marshmallow Fluff, now that is dangerous knowledge to have!
So anyway back on track, cupcakes... chocolatey, fudgy cupcakes topped with a billowing cloud of caramel flavoured Italian meringue buttercream, drizzled with more salted caramel and finished off with a little chocolate shard! Heaven! These quickly got sent with Mr. Grad to work because, you know, its not a good idea to leave me alone with 12 of these babies! Everyone LOVED them. I tell ya I'm making that man look good! I mean... just look at them... who could resist?**
So without further ado, I present to you...
