Halloween Cupcakes

Chocolate Graveyard Cupcakes!

These are super yummy. I used the Hershey's Chocolate Cupcake recipe (on the back of their cocoa powder box). The recipe is at the bottom, if you want it. Just a word of warning, when it says the batter is runny, they mean it! It is really, really runny. But don't worry, it's supposed to be, and they turn out delicious!

After making the chocolate cupcakes, I made a simple ganache (1.5 parts chocolate to 1 part heavy whipping cream) and used an injector to pipe it into the middle. Then I took a tub of cool whip, died it green and added just a little bit of peppermint extract. I frosted the cupcakes with that, and put some crushed up mint cookies on top.

Finally, I added a little gravestone for each cupcake. For those, I took some grasshopper cookies and cut them into the shape of tombstones (the extra parts I cut off worked out great for sprinkling on top), and wrote RIP on them. I happened to have orange frosting on hand, so that's what they got.

Chocolate Mint Cupcakes

2 C sugar

1 3/4 C flour

3/4 C cocoa powder

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1 1/2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

2 eggs

1 C milk

1/2 C vegetable oil

2 tsp vanilla extract

1 C boiling water

Directions:

1. Heat over to 3500F. Line 2 1/2 in. muffin cups with paper bake cups.

2. Combine dry ingredients in large bowl. Add eggs, milk, oil and vanilla; beat on med. speed 2 min. Stir in boiling water (batter will be thin). Pour into pans.

3. Bake 22-25 min. or until wooden toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool 10 min.; remove from pans to wire racks. Cool completely.