Mocha Cupcakes With Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting

Cupcakes all lined up.

Today my sister and I had a little breakthrough. Our icing is finally not too sweet. These cupcakes was made with a friend in mind, Sara. She and I often do rounds of coffee together while bitching about life. Thus these mocha cupcakes was made.

And this one,was by Saty. She's good at it.

Mocha Cupcakes

2 2/3 cups cake flour

1 cup cocoa powder

2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon powder

3 teaspoons instant coffee powder

1 cup hot water

2 teaspoons vanilla

1 cup milk

1 cup butter

2 cups sugar

2 eggs

1. Beat the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.

2. Add in the eggs and continue beating until thoroughly mixed. In another bowl, mixed the dry ingredients; flour, cocoa powder, baking soda and powder, salt, and cinnamon powder.

3. Add 1/2 of the flour mix into the butter sugar mixture. Dilute the instant coffee powder with the hot water and pour into the batter. Mix well.

4. Fold in another half batch of the flour mix, and finally stir in the vanilla and milk.

5. Pour batter into lined muffin tins 2/3 full. Bake at 180 C for 30 minutes or until toothpick test is satisfactory.

Saty did this one too.

Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting

6 oz cream cheese

1 cup icing sugar (the recipe said 2 cups, but we reduced it so it won't be too sweet, and add some cocoa powder instead. If you like it sweet, add in a cup more icing sugar. The cocoa powder is optional and you'll probably need less of it).

6 oz bittersweet chocolate (melted over simmering hot water)

3 tablespoons milk

1 teaspoon vanilla

5-8 teaspoons of cocoa powder

1. Cream the cheese and icing sugar in a bowl.

2. Beat in the melted chocolate, then followed by the milk and vanilla.

3. Add in the cocoa powder, a teaspoon at a time, beating well after each addition until you reach the consistency you like for the frosting.

I wasn't so creative with the toppings. But this one was made by myself.

We iced the cooled cupcakes with the frosting, and my sister Saty went crazy with the toppings. She's creative, but often lose focus if she had to do too many. Haha..but thank god she has the interest in decorating cakes if not making them.

Cute little swirls. Always by Saty.

After we've iced all the cupcakes, we still got some frosting left, so I stored them in the fridge just to see if the frosting freezes well. Will try to use it again for the next project.

Ahh..but this one's mine. Simple, but I love it.

For Sara, I did nine of the above design and put them in a cake box, secured by sections made from corrugated paper. Take a look at them..