Peanut Butter Cup Cupcakes

The end of February and the month of March are busy birthday times for me.  Every couple of weeks we are having a birthday celebration.  This year we combined our oldest daughters together.  My daughter requested her favorite Cinnamon Roll cupcakes (recipe and post coming soon) and the Mr.'s daughter requested Peanut butter cup cupcakes.  This was the first request for anything peanut butter and I have been wanting to bake with it for a while now so I was excited to give it a try.  Growing up one of my favorites was Reese's peanut butter cups (once many many years ago i bought a bag of the miniatures and ate every last one of them.. I don't think I could get away with that now).  This cupcake definitely brought back childhood memories.  Indulge!

INGREDIENTS:

FOR THE CUPCAKES

1 package devil’s food cake mix

1 package instant chocolate pudding mix

1 cup sour cream

1 cup vegetable oil

4 eggs, lightly beaten

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1 tablespoon instant espresso granules dissolved in ½ cup warm water

24 Reese’s Miniatures frozen (this prevents them from disappearing into the batter)

For the peanut butter frosting

(adapted slightly from Pioneer Woman’s, “The Best Frosting I’ve Ever Had”)

5Tablespoons Flour

½ cup milk

½ cup heavy cream

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 cup butter

1 cup granulated sugar (not powdered sugar)

½ cup peanut butter

DIRECTIONS:

FOR THE CUPCAKES

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F and line muffin tin with paper liners.

In the bowl of a stand mixer, fitted with a paddle attachment, or with a hand mixer in a large bowl, beat together the cake and pudding mix, sour cream, oil, eggs, vanilla and espresso water mixture.  Beat for about two minutes on medium speed until well combined.

Using a large cookie scoop, distribute the batter between 24 tins, about 3 tablespoons of batter per tin.  Press one frozen Reese’s into the center of each cupcake.

Bake in a preheated oven for 18 to 22 minutes or until the tops of the cakes spring back when lightly touched.  There will be a small sinkhole in the top of the cupcakes from the Reese’s, that’s okay – you’ll cover that with frosting.  Allow cupcakes to cool .

FOR THE PEANUT BUTTER FROSTING

In a small saucepan, whisk flour into milk and cream, stirring constantly until it thickens.  You will want it to be very thick, thicker than cake mix more like brownie mix.  Remove from heat and let it cool to room temperature.  It must be completely cool before you use it.  Stir in vanilla

While the mixture is cooling, cream the butter, sugar and peanut butter until light and fluffy.  Then add the cooled flour mixture and beat the living daylights out of it.  If it looks separated, you haven’t beaten it enough.  Beat until it all combines and resembles whipped cream.

Grab a spoon and taste this wonderful goodness.  If there is any left after your taste test, pipe onto your cupcakes finish with chopped Reese’s or I found this cute mini mini peanut butter cups.  Indulge!