[Inez] Nutella cupcakes

I've always loved white cupcakes with nutella on top, but it's admittedly a little intense. I've been thinking for a while about lightening it up by folding some whipped cream into the nutella. Cooking dinner for Quaker House with Em Tem was the perfect excuse to finally try it out!

For the white cake I usually either stick with the Joy of Cooking's Lightning Cake or One Egg Cake. In this case I went with the Lightning cake, which I just converted into cupcakes.

Cupcake recipe (make 18 cupcakes):

• Preheat oven to 375 F. Sift flour, salt, and sugar into a large bowl.
  
• 1/2 cup butter, softened
  
• 1 3/4 cups flour
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 3/4 cups sugar (the Joy says one cup but I say you don't need all that)
• 2 eggs
• 1/2 cup + 2 1/2 tsp milk
• 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp vanilla

1. Preheat oven to 375 F. Sift flour, salt, and sugar into a large bowl.

2. Add milk, eggs, and butter. [For people who don't like using beaters (Becca) I would recommend creaming the butter before adding it with the milk and eggs to the dry ingredients.] Beat on low speed for one minute, scrape bowl. Beat on medium speed for 1 1/2 minutes, scrape bowl. 

3.  Fold in baking powder and vanilla, beat on low speed for 30 seconds.

This is where I took some liberties. I remembered those molten chocolate cakes with the delicious ganache glob, all melty and amazing in the middle, and also blueberry muffins with cream cheese baked into the center. I thought, why not put a little nutella surprise in the cupcakes? So I filled the cupcake papers halfway, added a tiny dab of nutella to each one, and then topped it off with more batter.

4. Bake at 375 F for 15-20 minutes. Let cool completely before frosting.

Now, I want to preface this next bit by saying that this is a frosting recipe that I just invented today and I think it needs more tinkering. If you play around with it, please let me know what you do and how it turns out!

Nutella frosting:

• 1 small jar Nutella
  
• 1 oz unsweetened chocolate (optional)
• 1/2 stick butter, softened
• 1/2 pint whipping cream

I added an ounce of unsweetened chocolate to the nutella because nutella is very sweet, because I had an ounce of unsweetened chocolate left over, and because nutella is very gooey and I wanted to smooth it out a bit. I think I'd like to try adding 2 ounces next time, to cut the sweet even more.

1. Melt the chocolate, add to the nutella. Mix well.

2. Cream butter, add to the nutella mixture. When I did it, I initially added only 1/2 stick of butter but the texture was still unsatisfactory, so I added another 1/2 stick. Ultimately the frosting was too buttery and rich for my liking, so next time I would only add 1/2 stick butter and hope the texture turns out okay after folding in the whipped cream.

That brings me to

3. Whip the cream until stiff peaks form, but not so much that the whipped cream begins to lose its smoothness. Fold a large spoonful of whipped cream into the the nutella mixture to lighten it up a bit, and then fold in the rest.

Frost the cupcakes liberally and enjoy!