Easter Redux: Cadbury Creme Egg Cupcakes

Way back three Easters ago Robin and I had a great flirt bake-athon where I taught her the ways of the holiday with adorably decorated Sugar Cookies, the only time peeps have ever been tasty, and the true candy spirit of the season capturing Cadbury Creme Egg Cupcakes. While we thoroughly enjoyed eating cupcakes stuffed with the greatest holiday candy known to man, I always felt like something was missing. They were great but not nearly memorable enough to be worthy of their British namesake.

This year, I decided to prove how far my baking skills have come over the past few years by combining all the knowledge I have acquired over time to generate the ultimate Cadbury Creme Egg Cupcake. I was going to have to dig deep going all the way back to my first ever time baking cupcakes with Jenny (which is sadly pre-blog) to achieve maximum Easter.

Cadbury Creme Egg Cupcakes Take Deux
Cake Adapted from Food.com and Previously seen Here
Ganache Adapted from The Barefoot Contessa
Time: 90 minutes
Servings: 36 cupcakes


Cake
3 cups all-purpose flour

Yet another great culinary Rorschach Test. I see a dog dancing!

2 cups sugar
1/2 cup cocoa powder
2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
2 cups milk
10 tbsp vegetable oil
2 tbsp cider vinegar
2 tbsp vanilla
16 oz cream cheese, softened
2 eggs
2/3 cup sugar
36 Mini Cadbury Creme Eggs, frozen
36 Crispy Cadbury Mini Eggs

Ganache
12 oz semi-sweet chocolate chips
3/4 cup heavy cream

My double boiler needs some work

1. Decide to show everyone that your Easter game is on point.
2. Hate yourself for thinking that statement.
3. Preheat the oven to 350 F. 
4. Whisk the flour, sugar, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt together in a large bowl. Set aside.
5. Make the creamy sugar filling by beating the cream cheese until soft. Then add beat in the eggs and sugar until smooth. Set aside.
6. Stir the milk, vegetable oil, cider vinegar, and vanilla together with in a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment at medium speed.
7. Gradually add the dry ingredients to the oil mixture at low speed until just incorporated. 
8. Fill lined cupcake tins ~ half full with batter. Scoop ~1 tbsp of the filling on top of each, and insert a frozen mini creme egg in the center. It is extremely important that you do not overfill as the egg will displace a decent amount of batter. The overfilled ones will tend to get horrible dimples above the creme egg (which are thankfully covered up with ganache).
9. Bake for 14-18 minutes (rotating once halfway through) or until the toothpick test comes back clean and the tops have set.
10. Let the cupcakes cool on wire racks.
11. While the cupcakes cool make the ganache by stirring the chocolate chips and heavy cream together in a double boiler until melted and smooth.
12. Frost each cupcake with ganache, and top with a crispy mini egg. For best results, serve cold.

These cupcakes already look like the most fun ever and they don't even have frosting yet!

It is unbelievably fortunate that science says calories don't count on holidays, because I don't even want to think about the Sisyphean task that would be attempting to work these off (which would at least keep you busy until next Easter). Many times during my baking career I have thought that I could not possibly make anything more rich or decadent (see Pop Tart Cake, Car Bomb Cupcakes, and two versions of Chocolate Covered Strawberry Cupcakes), but time and time again I have proven myself wrong. When cream filled candy is the least sinful aspect of your dessert, you just know it's gonna be good (and worthy of a tall glass of milk). The black and white cupcake featured my favorite moist and bouncy chocolate cake recipe that was only made more absurdly delectable by the smooth cream cheese swirl that perfectly embodied the creamy heart of our hidden Cadbury treat. The ganache emphasized the bursting chocolate flavor and helped replicate the egg shell, while the crispy egg garnish added a nice crunch to all the gooey goodness contained in the cake. Our last attempt may have been great, but these were unholy levels of legendary. Fortunately for us, it only makes sense to eat them once a year.

Failure to properly place the egg or putting too much batter will lead to some interesting developments once the cupcakes start to cool. Fortunately, ganache will hide this.

Layer upon layer of pure, absurdly rich perfection. This is my favorite picture ever not involving dogs.