Hello everyone!
Today was an interesting day – the weather was insane! One minute it’s nighttime in your house because of how dark the clouds are and the next it’s as sunny as can be.
Completely unpredictable 
Anywhoo… Did you know that the largest cupcake was 1,224 pounds? The cupcake was 4 feet tall and 10 feet wide. That’s HUGE.
Sine I had these awesome monkey cupcake liners, I decided that banana cupcakes would be the perfect thing to fill them with. These cupcakes have two different types of frosting: Cream cheese & peanut butter. Not to mention they have a chocolate mousse filling. Yumm :]
Banana Cupcake:
1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 ripe bananas (make sure they are REALLY, REALLY ripe! Mine weren’t and the banana
flavor wasn’t that strong)
1/2 cup sour cream
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
3/4 cups sugar
1/2 cup butter
1 egg
1 egg yolk
– With rack in the center of the oven, pre-heat to 350 degrees.
– Mash bananas with fork ( Really mash those suckers. No large chunks remaining.)
– Mix the vanilla and sour cream into the bananas and set aside.
– In a small bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, soda and salt.
– In an electric mixer, beat the butter and sugar until fluffy.
– Turn the mixer off!
– Now, add the egg and egg yolk.
– Mix on medium speed until well mixed.
** This next step is important!!
– Add the flour mixture and the banana mixture alternately.
*Flour. Banana. Flour. Banana. Flour.
– Fill the muffin cups 2/3 full and bake for about 20 minutes.
** Make sure they are completely cooked by inserting a toothpick in the middle!!!
– Transfer the cupcakes onto a wire rack and let cool.
Chocolate Mousse Filling:
1/2 envelope of unflavored gelatin
1 tablespoon cold water
1/8 cup boiling water
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup powdered cocoa (I used Hershey’s)
1 cup cold whipping cream
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
– In a small bowl sprinkle the gelatin over the cold water.
– Set aside around 2 minutes to soften.
– After 2 minutes, add the boiling water.
– Stir the gelatin until it is completely dissolved…set aside.
– In an electric mixer, mix together the sugar and cocoa.
– Then, add the whipping cream and vanilla.
– Beat on medium speed until stiff.
** Make sure to scrape the bottom of the bowl!
– Slowly mix in the gelatin until well combined.
– With an apple corer, hollow out the middle of the cupcakes.
– Then, get a round tip (I used size 12) and insert it into the icing bag.
– Fill the icing bag with the chocolate mousse and fill the centers of the cupcakes until just full
** Do Not Overfill!
Cream Cheese Frosting:
4 oz unsalted butter, at room temperature
4 oz cream cheese, at room temperature
1 cup powdered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
– With an electric mixer, cream together butter and cream cheese.
– With the mixer on low speed, sprinkle in the powdered sugar.
** Don’t dump the sugar! It will go all over the place (at least it has for me in the past)
– Then, mix in the vanilla.
– When everything is mixed together completely, grab an icing bag fitted with a swirl tip (I used the 1M tip from Wilton’s) and fill it with the icing.
– Starting from the outside of the cupcake, go around the edge and swirl inward until you reach the middle, pulling up quickly to create a point.
Peanut Butter Frosting:
1 cup creamy peanut butter
1/2 cup butter, at room temperature
2 cups powdered sugar
4-5 tablespoons milk
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
– With an electric mixer, cream together peanut butter and butter.
– With the mixer on low speed, sprinkle in the powdered sugar.
** Once again, don’t dump the sugar!
– Then, mix in the milk and vanilla.
** If the frosting is too thick, add another tablespoon of milk until it is just right for piping.
– When everything is mixed together completely, fit another icing bag with the same tip you used for the cream cheese frosting.
– Using the same technique for the cream cheese frosting, frost the remaining cupcakes with the peanut butter.
After all this work you can finally sit back and enjoy the cupcakes. They are really, really good. If I could, I would eat them all :]
Simply Desserts 