Chocolate Chip Cupcakes

Potlucks always stress me out because I am so indecisive. I consider myself to be a pregnant lady at all times because there is just no way to guess what I am going to crave in the next five minutes. You are probably pretty safe with anything rhyming with shmocolate though.

But I digress... We do a potluck here and there at work and last time I made Paula Deen's banana pudding which is SO. GOOD.  I didn't want to bring in the same recipe again (even though I wish I did because I had lots of people ask me about it....*blushing*) so I went with a pretty easy request for yellow cake with chocolate frosting from one of my co-workers. I also was craving coconut rice pudding for whatever in god's name reason so I made a huge pot of that too. Which I of course accidentally left at home. Also I made all of these things at 11:30 at night. See below what happens when you cook tired..

Just roasting my oven mitts on high! 

The cupcakes are simple yellow boxed cake mix but the best part is the frosting. This frosting is my go-to frosting recipe. It is beyond delicious and beyond terrible for you! This was my first time making it chocolate since I usually prefer vanilla buttercream frosting and it actually came out pretty good. I still prefer the original buttercream though! Also a trick I use when making box cupcakes is to fill the muffin cups up to pretty close to the top with batter. Usually they say one box makes like 24 cupcakes but they end up being flat and your cake to frosting ratio is thrown way off. I'd say when I make a box of cupcakes I only produce about 15 or so. This makes it seem like I am eating less cupcakes when 15 are gone instead of 24. I should also note that when I make my frosting I really just kind of wing it. I have included the best estimate of what an actual handwritten recipe will look like. And trust me...you will want to remember this one. You will never buy Duncan Hines again!

                  BUTTERCREAM FROSTING

2 sticks of butter softened (NOT MELTED!)

3 1/2 cups powdered sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons of milk or heavy cream

Cream the butter. Add the powdered sugar, salt, and vanilla. Cream until well mixed. Beat in the milk. You may need more or less depending on the consistency of the frosting. You ideally want your frosting to be thick and heavy so that when you stick a spoon straight up in it, it does not lean.

To make this frosting chocolate I added about 1/2 cup cocoa powder. You could also add different flavors like almond extract, lemon extract, mint extract etc. I find that the rich buttery taste is best left alone though!