Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween folks!

Unfortunately I've never been a big fan of Halloween.
I scare very easily and I'm not big on people covered in fake blood and scary men in masks jumping out of nowhere. Mmm, no thank you, I try to stay away from things that terrify me.
I'm more into the happy, joyful, Christmas and Thanksgiving, everybody-loves-each-other-and-there's-no-zombies holidays.

And I hate scary movies! The Shining pretty much scarred me for life... I'll never be the same. (just kidding Mom). I'm such a baby when it comes to scary movies though, I can't even watch the commercials for them. I just hate being scared, I'd rather be around nice, pretty things like sunshine, cake, and puppies.

But, this Halloween I was stuck inside studying anyways so I didn't have the choice to dress up. Hours of PreCalc homework was the scariest thing I saw all night.

Most Halloween confections really creep me out. The witches fingers especially. Not okay with feeling like I'm eating fingers okay.
Or cupcakes decorated like eyeballs or spiders. Ick.
I don't want to think about eating eyeballs, no thank you! 

Nevertheless, I did manage to squeeze in time to bake up some Halloween cupcakes a few nights before hand. I've made this same recipe as a chocolate cake and everybody raved about it, so I thought I'd try it in cupcake-form for some dark, deadly cupcakes! They are rich and moist, and incredibly chocolatey. Needless to say they were a big hit among my roommates!

Eek! Ghost in the batter! Spooky...

 Let the little monsters chill out in the pan for a few minutes

 Decorated in the least-scary way possible. No spider cupcakes for this girl

 Sprinkles. Get into it

Chocolate Cupcakes

from: MyBakingAddiction

Ingredients:

1¾ cups all-purpose flour
2 cups sugar 

¾ cups good cocoa powder

2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 cup buttermilk, shaken

½ cup vegetable oil

2 large eggs, at room temperature
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1 cup freshly brewed hot coffee

 Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line standard muffin tins with paper liners; set aside.

2. Sift the flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder, and salt into the bowl and mix until just combined. In another bowl, combine the buttermilk, oil, eggs, and vanilla. Slowly add the wet ingredients to the dry. While mixing, add the coffee and stir just to combine, scraping the bottom of the bowl with a rubber spatula.

3. Spoon batter into 24 muffin tins, filling each  2/3 full. Bake for 18 to 22 minutes, switching positions halfway through, or until a cake tester comes out clean. Cool in the pans for 10 minutes, then remove to a cooling rack and cool completely.

Vanilla Buttercream

 from: Cook's Illustrated

**NOTE: This recipe makes about 1½ cups, enough to frost 12 cupcakes, I made one and a half recipes worth because I don't like to put a lot of frosting on cupcakes, but you'll probably want to double it.

Also, if you don't want to use a vanilla bean, omit it and increase the vanilla extract to 1½ teaspoons.

If you are using a handheld mixer, increase mixing times by at least 50 percent.

Ingredients:

10 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened

½ vanilla bean, halved lengthwise

1¼ cups confectioners' sugar 

Pinch of table salt

½ teaspoon vanilla extract

1 tablespoon heavy cream

Directions:

1. In standing mixer fitted with whisk attachment, beat butter at medium-high speed until smooth, about 20 seconds. Using paring knife, scrape seeds from vanilla bean into butter and beat mixture at medium-high speed to combine, about 15 seconds.

2. Add confectioners' sugar and salt; beat at medium-low speed until most of sugar is moistened, about 45 seconds. Scrape down bowl and beat at medium speed until mixture is fully combined, about 15 seconds; scrape bowl, add vanilla extract and heavy cream, and beat at medium speed until incorporated, about 10 seconds, then increase speed to medium-high and beat until light ans fluffy, about 4 minutes, scraping down side of bowl once or twice.