I’ve been wicked sick the past few days, and I haven’t had the fortitude to bake. But tonight I decided to make this recipe, mainly because I had mini-chocolate chips and cocoa and didn’t wanna make plain old chocolate chocolate chip cupcakes. See how gangsta I look in that picture? Damn straight. Irish cupcake gangstas unite!

This recipe is from 500 Cupcakes: The Only Cupcake Compendium You’ll Ever Need by Fergal Connolly, a lovely Irish boy (and perhaps… an Irish cupcake gangsta?). Well I don’t know if hes lovely, but he is indeed Irish, and in the spirit of St. Patty’s Day which is rapidly coming up, a cupcake recipe by an Irishman which involves mint and green coloring seemed somewhat appropriate. I’ve never used any recipe from this book before, I have heard some sketchy things (too dry, too muffin-like, blah blah..) but I figured why the hell not. Happy friggin’ March!

So anyway on we go to the dirt on the ‘cakes…

This recipe is supposed to make 18, but I got 20. The batter was very much like cookie dough batter, unless I did something wrong. So it was a bit hard to fill the cupcake liners. I didn’t use self-rising flour, I did the old baking powder + salt cheat but I doubt that would make a difference. I’ve done it on many different cupcakes and it never caused dryness before, so I can’t imagine why it would with this. I do suspect that the baking powder may have something to do with it. I didn’t use superfine sugar either, I just double sifted regular granulated sugar. And I also didn’t much care for the frosting recipe, it was too dry, so I added some milk and it was perfect. Unfortunately I can’t remember how much milk, but if you agree with me… and want to add it yourself, just start off with a tablespoon and go from there. In turn, I added an extra half cup confectioners sugar. And.. last but not least, the final change to the recipe that I made… I used mini-chocolate chips instead of regular. The recipe I list below is the original, without my changes. If you’re lazy, and don’t wanna bother to add my changes to it yourself to make a complete faked-up recipe, just ask me and I’ll gladly do it for you. I have nothing better to do.

That said, the cupcakes came out a bit dry. Not so dry they fell apart when eating them but drier than most. They were very tasty, however. Reminded me of mint chocolate chip ice cream. Except not cold and melty. Would I make them again? Probably.

Mint Chocolate Chip Cupcakes

For the cupcakes:

• 1 ½ cups self-rising flour
• 4 tablespoons Dutch-process cocoa powder
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 cup superfine sugar
• 1 cup unsalted sweet cream butter, softened
• 4 eggs
• 1 tsp mint extract
• ½ cup semisweet chocolate chip

For the frosting:

• ½ cup unsalted butter, softened
• 2 cups confectioner’s sugar, sifted
• 1 tsp mint extract
• green food coloring
• ½ cup chocolate chips for decorating

Then you:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Place paper baking cups in muffin pans.

Ina medium bowl, sift together the flour, cocoa, and baking powder. Set aside. Beat the sugar and butter together in a large bowl until smooth. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add the flour mixture gradually, stirring until well combined. Stir in the mint extract and chocolate chips.

Spoon the mixture into the cups. Bake for 20 minutes. Remove the pans from the oven and cool for 5 minutes. Then remove the cupcakes and cool on rack.

To make the frosting, beat the butter and confectioner’s sugar in a small bowl until smooth and creamy. Stir in the mint extract and just enough food coloring to turn the frosting green. Frost the cupcakes and decorate with chocolate chips.

El fin.