Tag Archives: toffee

October 22, 2012 · 5:00 am

Better Than Sex Cupcakes

These are messy, very messy, messy like…

I’m not going to go there!  Ruth requested a fun, girly cupcake for a bachelorette weekend.  After some heavy brainstorming, this is what we came up with!  One Valentine’s Day, a hundred years ago, I made a better than sex cake for a ladies night and I remember a boxed mix with caramel topping, cool whip, sweetened condensed milk, and toffee bars.  I wanted to make an updated, from scratch version – so here it goes!

First, bake and cool the cupcakes.  Make the dulce de leche too.

Then, poke a lot of holes in the top.  You want there to be places for all the dulce de leche.

Use lots of foil here – you’re going to make a mess, but try to minimize! Pour a generous amount of dulce de leche on top of each cupcake.

Now pipe a swirl of beautiful frosting.

Place a few pieces of Heath bars on top.

Finally, get really messy and find your inner Pollack!  Artfully squiggle fudge sauce and extra dulce de leche.  Finish with an extra sprinkling of Heath bars.

Place cupcakes in the fridge to firm up because things are starting to move around.

And the taste as stated by Ruth, I did not taste one :-( – “A dense, deep, dark chocolate cupcake, meets a light buttercream frosting accented with dulce de leche drizzle and Heath bits.  The cupcake was soft and melted in your mouth yet the cupcake lingered in your mouth because of the bite of the Heath bar.  It’s a party in your mouth!”

Print the Recipe!

Chocolate Cupcakes
Yield – 12 cupcakes
Adapted from Chocolate Cupcakes with Vanilla Frosting

3/4 cup flour
1/3 cup cocoa, I used Hershey’s Dark
3/4 cup sugar
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 egg
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 cup + 2 tablespoons whole milk
1/3 cup hot water

  1. Preheat the oven to 350 F.
  2. Sift the flour, cocoa powder, sugar, soda, powder, and salt into the bowl of a stand mixer.  Mix together on low with the paddle attachment.
  3. Beat together the eggs, oil, vanilla, and milk in a small bowl and add to the dry ingredients.
  4. Mix until just combined and then scrape down the sides.  Turn on the mixer and add the hot water slowly until well combined.
  5. Fill 12 cupcakes liners with a basic ice cream scoop and bake for 15 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into a cupcake comes out clean.  Cool completely on a wire rack.

Whipped Vanilla Frosting
3/4 cup whole milk
3 1/4 tablespoons flour
1 teaspoons vanilla extract
3/4 cup (12 tablespoons) unsalted butter, room temperature
3/4 cups granulated sugar
food coloring

  1. In a small saucepan over medium heat, whisk together the milk and flour.  Keep whisking until the mixture becomes smooth and thick resembling pancake batter.
  2. Remove from the heat, stir in the vanilla and allow to cool completely.
  3. Beat together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy – beat for 8 minutes
  4. Add in the cooled flour/milk mixture and beat until the entire frosting is light and fluffy, about another 5-8 minutes.
  5. Add the food coloring and mix until well combined.

Assembly
Dulce de Leche
Fudge Sauce
3 Heath Bars, chopped

  1. Make the dulce de leche the night before by poking three holes in the top of a can of sweetened condensed milk.  Place the can with the holes up in a small saucepan surrounded by water.  Boil for four hours.  Add more water as needed.  Open the can and stir before using.
  2. Poke several holes in the top of each cupcake.
  3. Pour about 1 tablespoon of the dulce de leche over each cupcake.  Spread with a spatula.
  4. Use a large star tip to pipe the frosting on the cupcakes.
  5. Place 4-5 larger pieces of Heath bars on each cupcake.
  6. Drizzle with the fudge sauce and extra dulce de leche.  Sprinkle any remaining Heath bars on top.
  7. Refrigerate until serving.
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January 23, 2012 · 5:23 am

Heath Toffee Cupcakes

These cupcakes should look familiar, they are the heading for this blog!  I made these birthday cupcakes for my dear friend and baking buddy Irene.  Irene and I spend a lot time looking at cooking blogs, talking about recipes, and emailing each other ideas.  It’s so nice to have a friend I see almost day to discuss the ins-and-outs of baking/cooking.  We spend almost every lunch period discussing what turned out well, what didn’t, and how to improve.  Not everyone understands the frustrations, triumphs, costs, and time that goes into baking/cooking, but Irene does!

This recipe, like many so far, is from one of our favorite bloggers Annie, from Annie’s Eats.  Many mornings start with “Did you see what Annie posted?”  Usually we can finish each other’s sentence.  When we saw this recipe I asked if she wanted me to make these for her birthday and she said said absolutely!

The chocolate cupcake is a little dry and crumbly but still has a great flavor.  The ganache is delicious, but I bet it is hard to find a bad ganache!  The toffee inside the cupcake and on the ganache is a delicious treat!  I think toffee is an underutilized flavor, it’s a nice change from mint, caramel, or peanut butter as an accompaniment to chocolate.  The caramel Swiss meringue butter cream is sweet and delightful.  If you have never made SWBC do it!  It is worth the effort and the double boiler.  Again my caramel was a little chunky in the SWBC, but there was strong caramel flavor throughout.

Print the recipe!

Heath Toffee Cupcakes – adapted from Annie’s Eats
Yield – 16 cupcakes

Chocolate Cupcakes
1 cups all-purpose flours
1/4 + 1/8 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 table. espresso powder – I used instant coffee
1/2 tea. baking soda
1/4 tea. salt
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
2 eggs
1 tea. vanilla
1/2 cup coffee
1/2 cup toffee bits – I used chopped up Heath bars (about 2 1/2)

Preheat the oven to 350 °F.  Sift together the flour, cocoa powder, instant coffee, baking soda, and salt onto wax paper.  I always sift onto wax paper because it makes it easy for me to get everything into the mixer and I don’t dirty a bowl.  In the bowl of a mixer with a paddle attachment beat together the butter and sugar until pale yellow.  This takes about 3 minutes.  Beat in the eggs one at a time and then beat in the vanilla.  Add the dry ingredients on the slowest speed in three batches with half the coffee in between.  Beat to combine.  I couldn’t find toffee bits, so I chopped up Heath bars into  ¼” pieces and folded them into the batter.  Using a standard ice cream scoop, place into the lined cupcake pans.  Bake 18 minutes checking to make sure the batter is done with a toothpick.  Some of the toffee bubbles up and looks real cool.  Place immediately on a wire rack to cool.

Ganache
4 oz bittersweet chocolate
1/2 cup heavy cream
1 1/2  table. unsalted butter
1 cup toffee bits – I used chopped up Heath bars (about 3 1/2)

In a small sauce pan heat the heavy cream until it begins to simmer.  Pour the cream over the chopped chocolate.  Stir to combine and melt the chocolate. Add in the butter and again stir until everything is melted and deliciously creamy.  Put aside to cool.  Once cool, scoop the ganache into a piping bag with a round tip and pipe a ring around the the edge of each cupcake.  Place the chopped Heath bars on a plate and hold the cupcake upside down to dip into the pieces of candy.  Add extra candy by hand if you need to!

Caramel Swiss Meringue Butter Cream
5 egg whites
1 1/2  cup sugar
4 sticks unsalted butter, room temperature
1/2 tea. kosher salt
1 table. vanilla
1/3 cup melted caramel (I used the little squares and melted them in the microwave)

Place the egg whites and the sugar in a heat proof bowl over a pot of simmering water.  Make sure the bowl does not touch the water.  Whisk the mixture frequently until you no longer feel any grittiness when you rub the mixture between your fingers.  Transfer the mixture into the bowl of your stand mixer and beat at high speed with a whisk attachment until stiff peaks form and the bowl feel cools.  I swear to you, sometimes this takes 3 minutes, other days it takes 10.  Add in the butter 2 tablespoons at a time on a medium speed until all the butter is added.  Don’t worry if it looks funky, just keep beating.  Add in the salt, vanilla, and melted (and cooled) caramel into the mixer.  Fill a pastry bag with a star tip and pipe in the hole of ganache.  This frosting is delicious, the more the better!

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