Mocha Cheesecakes

Mocha Cheesecakes

Cheesecake: my eternal go-to for a quick, elegant cupcake. So easy! and everyone likes them so much! That said, I did get some complaints about the strength of the coffee flavor. If you are not a coffee fan, or prefer it to be a bit milder, you may want to adjust the amount of coffee you put in the recipe.

Crust:

1 1/2 cup chocolate graham crackers, finely ground (about 1 sleeve)

3 tbsp sugar

6 tbsp butter, melted

Preheat oven to 325 F.

Mix together all the ingredients until slightly moist. Press a thin layer into the bottom of your prepared cupcake liners.

Bake for 5 minutes.

Sour Cream Mixture:

1 1/2 cup sour cream

2 tsp coffee powder

3 tbsp sugar

Mix together until the coffee powder has dissolved fully into the mixture.

Set aside.

Cheesecakes:

3 tsp instant coffee/espresso powder

1 lb cream cheese (2 8-oz packages)

3/4 cup sugar

3 eggs

3/4 cup sour cream

2 tbsp flour

4 oz unsweetened chocolate, melted and cooled

Leave oven at 325 F.

Mix the coffee powder with 2 tsp of warm water and set aside.

Beat cream cheese and sugar until fluffy. Add eggs, one a a time. Add sour cream and flour, and mix until well-combined. Add the espresso mixture and the chocolate.

Fill the cupcake tins about 2/3 full. 

Bake for ten minutes, then remove and top with sour cream mixture. 

Bake another 10 minutes. When the cupcakes are done, turn off the oven and let them stand in it for another 25 minutes.

Remove cupcakes from the oven and sprinkle with cocoa powder.

Garnish as desired. Makes 30.

Adapted for cupcakes from rightathome.com

Bonus: This weekend I made fifty mint-chocolate whoopie pies for a library fundraiser!

Cookies and Cream Cupcakes with Mocha Frosting

Cookies and Cream Cupcakes with Mocha Frosting

Cupcakes:

2 cups flour

1 1/2 cups sugar

3 tsp baking powder

6 tbsp (3/4 stick) butter, room temp

1 cup whole milk

2 eggs

2 tsp vanilla

24 oreo cookies

Preheat oven to 325 F.

Sift together flour, sugar, and baking powder, then add butter and beat slowly until mixture forms sandy crumbs. Slowly pour in 3/4 cup milk and beat until just mixed.

Whisk together 1/4 cup milk, eggs, and vanilla. Pour into the flour and beat until ingredients are combined and batter is smooth, about one minute. Be careful not to over mix.

Split the oreos in half so that one half has the cream and other is smooth. Take the cream side and place one in the bottom of each cupcake liner in your tins, cream side up.

Crumble all but 8 of the remaining naked sides and stir them into the batter.

Fill each liner about 2/3 full -- these rise a fair amount, so don't overfill.

Bake for 14 minutes, turn, bake 14 minutes.

Let cool.

Makes about 24 cupcakes.

Frosting:

2 cups xxx sugar, sifted

8 tbsp cocoa powder

3 tbsp butter, room temp

3 tsp vanilla

1/4 cup strong coffee

Sift together xxx sugar and cocoa powder, then beat in vanilla and butter. Add coffee slowly until icing reaches a spreadable consistency.

In retrospect, I was reminded of why I generally steer clear of cocoa powder in frostings: I think that the confectioner's sugar tends to blend with the cocoa powder in a way that brings out the cocoa powder's less pleasant qualities. The recipe would be less quick, but I think considerably better tasting, if you used bittersweet chocolate, melted with the butter, and blended that into the sugar. If someone tries this recipe, you will have to report!

To finish:

Take the remaining 8 naked-sided oreos and process them in a food processor -- or just crush them really finely using a mortar and pestle or something -- until they become fine crumbs.

Ice each cupcake moderately and sprinkle with oreo crumbs.

Cupcake recipe adapted from The Kitchen is My Playground.

Mocha Cupcakes with Seven-Minute Frosting and Coffee-Bean Garnish

Mocha Cupcakes with Seven-Minute Frosting and Coffee-Bean Garnish

Cupcakes:

2 1/4 cup flour, sifted

2 tbsp cocoa

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter

1 1/2 cup packed brown sugar

2 eggs

1 tsp vanilla

1 1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 cup sour cream

3/4 cup espresso

Preheat the oven to 325 F.

Whisk together flour and cocoa. In another bowl, cream butter until smooth. Add brown sugar and eggs and beat until well-mixed. My recipe says "fluffy", but the batter was actually unnervingly grainy at this point. It's okay! Add vanilla and baking soda, beat until combined.

Add flour alternating with sour cream. I did not have enough sour cream, so I did halvies with plain yogurt and it worked great, no problem. Still got that nice moist texture. By now the batter also was starting to get smooth and not as weird-looking. Add the espresso (I just used super-strong coffee). The recipe also calls for 1 tbsp of espresso powder, which I didn't use because I didn't have any. I think the coffee flavor is still there, but if you like stuff really strongly flavored you may want to add the espresso powder. I will note the recipe says NOT INSANT COFFEE!!11!, idk the difference myself.

Fill lined baking cups about 3/4 full. The cupcakes do rise nicely, but the ones that overflowed still didn't stick to the pan; this was a nice batter. Bake 11 minutes, rotate, bake another 11 minutes. Let cool.

Frosting:

1 1/2 cups + 2 tbsp sugar

2/3 cup water

2 tbsp light corn syrup

6 egg whites

Combine 1 1/2 cups of sugar with water and corn syrup over medium heat (about 5 on a numbered stove). Use a candy thermometer to tell when the mixture reaches 230 degrees F ("soft ball"). Meanwhile, whisk the egg whites until they are soft peaks. Add 2 tbsp sugar to egg stuff.

When syrup reaches soft ball, take it off the heat immediately and slowly pour it down the side of the bowl of egg whites while beating on medium. When all the syrup is in, raise speed to medium-high and let it go for the proverbial seven minutes (stiff peaks, bowl is cool). I also added a tablespoon or so of the leftover coffee for flavour.

Dollop onto cupcakes; garnish with coffee beans.

Recipe and Frosting adapted from Martha Stewart's Cupcakes.

A word about the frosting: This is how Martha shows it looking on the cupcakes. NO WAY. There is some secret ingredient she is using to get that consistency, and I have NO IDEA what it is. I've made seven-minute frosting many times, and it is always, always the way it looks in my pics, not the way it looks in the book. I would love to be able to do that architectural sculpting, but no way. I have no idea what she did.