The Three C's Cupcake

Chocolate cream cheese filled Coconut Buttercream Cupcakes!! How does that grab you? I already have a chocolate cupcake recipe that is perfect and yes, it includes oil and not butter but the cupcakes come out moist, shiny, soft and delicious. These cupcakes were filled with a cream cheese filling and frosted with a coconut buttercream frosting. My daughters and the hubby hate coconut flakes so I omitted the flakes but I used coconut milk and coconut extract for flavor. The pairing is out of this world delicious.

Chocolate Cupcakes
Recipe adapted from Hershey's
Yields 24 cupcakes

Ingredients:
2 cups sugar
1-3/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup HERSHEY'S Cocoa
1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1-1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1 cup milk
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 cup boiling water

Directions
Heat oven to 350°F. Line your cupcake pans with your favorite liners.

Stir together sugar, flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt in large bowl. Add eggs, milk, oil and vanilla; beat on medium speed of mixer 2 minutes. Stir in boiling water (batter will be thin).

Fill cups 2/3 full with batter. Bake 15  minutes. Cool completely.

Cream Cheese Filling

Ingredients:
1 8oz cream cheese softened
1/2 cup powdered sugar
1/4 tsp vanilla extract

Directions:
Beat the cream cheese until softened on medium speed. Add the powdered sugar and the vanilla extract. Fill your cupcakes with whatever method you use best. Personally, I used my clean finger and punched a hole into every cupcake and used a wide tip attached to a pastry bag and filled each cupcake.

Coconut Buttercream
recipe my own

Ingredients:
2 sticks of butter, softened
4 cups of powdered sugar
2 tbsps of coconut milk
1 tsp of coconut extract

Directions:
Beat the butter, add the powdered sugar one cup at a time, add the milk and the coconut extract. Add a little more or less depending on your taste and piping consistency.  Pipe your cupcakes accordingly. I used tip 1M.
Garnish with a red chocolate covered cherry.