Mississippi Mud

As always happens this time of year December has gotten away from me and there are many things on my to do list that will probably still be there when 2013 rolls in.  One thing I was not going to leave on my list were the Mississippi Mud cupcakes for this months Cake Slice group.  I have made myself a promise to stick with the Cake Slice bakers this year and I am proud to say that I have met the baking deadline two months in a row.  I missed the posting deadline, but the cupcakes were made in time.

I have always been a fan of Mississippi Mud.  I remember a recipe for Mississippi Mud brownies in one of my first cookbooks when I was little.  I don't think I ever actually made the brownies, but I know I read the recipe many many times.

Julie Richardson's recipe for Mississippi Mud Cupcakes, in Vintage Cakes, is a wonderfully moist chocolate cupcake filled with chocolate chips and pecans and topped with a marshmallow frosting.  I didn't follow her recipe for the frosting. Instead I cheated with a Fluff buttercream, a super easy super tasty frosting.  The cupcakes were not overly sweet and the addition of coffee in the batter helped to enhance the chocolate and add a very subtle bitterness.  I didn't do a good job at evenly distributing the chocolate chips and pecans so the one cupcake I had only had a couple of chips and one tiny piece of pecan which made it seem more like something had fallen into the batter than an actual component of it.  If I were to make the recipe again I would probably just sprinkle the add-ins into each cupcake rather than mixing it into the full batter.

These cupcakes left my house very quickly.  I finished them at 8:00am and delivered them to the staff room at my kids' elementary school at 8:30.  I did keep one as a sample, it was great with a mid-morning cup of coffee.  It was so good that I forgot to snap a picture before inhaling the entire thing.

Please go check out the other Cake Slice bakers and all the delicious looking cupcakes!