Nutella Cupcakes

Yesterday, I was in a baking mood after I got home from work.  I decided to pick a recipe I’d found on Pinterest for Self-Frosting Nutella Cupcakes.  The recipe is simple and luckily uses staple ingredients, so I had everything on hand.

Self-frosting Nutella Cupcakes
1/4 cup butter, at room temperature
1/4 cup canola or mild vegetable oil
3/4 cup sugar
3 large eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
1 3/4 cup all purpose flour
2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1/4-1/2 cup Nutella, at room temperature

Preheat the oven to 325F.

In a medium bowl, beat the butter, oil and sugar with an electric mixer until light and fluffy. Add the eggs and vanilla and beat until smooth.

In a small bowl, stir together the flour, baking powder and salt; add to the butter mixture and beat on low speed just until combined. The batter will be thick. It needs to be in order to swirl in the Nutella!

Divide the batter between 12 paper-lined muffin cups. Drop a spoonful of Nutella on top of each, and swirl through the batter with the tip of a bamboo skewer, knife or other pointy object. Bake for 25-30 minutes, or until springy to the touch. Tilt them in the pan to help them cool. Makes a dozen cupcakes.

My cupcakes looked almost exactly like this picture.  The cupcake batter is very thick…almost as thick as a cookie dough.  Definitely not pourable.  I put a heaping spoonful in each muffin cup.  I put a dollop of Nutella in each muffin cup and swirled the batter and Nutella with a toothpick.  The only thing I would change is to more thoroughly mix the Nutella into the batter.  The top of each cupcake was nice and marbleized, but I didn’t get the Nutella down to the bottom of the cupcake.  Even though parts of the cupcakes weren’t chocolately, the cake itself is very like a pound cake, so it tastes good even without the Nutella.  I think I might add some orange extract to the batter next time…I’ve always heard that orange and chocolate go well together and I know orange extract is a good addition to Grams’ pound cake.

I took a few cupcakes to work to share with some of my sweet friends.  I know that guys will eat practically anything that’s cooked for them, so I thought they would be good guinea pigs for this new-to-me recipe.  They’re also having a crazy week with a big deadline on Tuesday and another tomorrow, so I thought they deserved a treat.  Cooking is much more fun when you have someone to cook for!!