German Chocolate Cupcakes

It was my boyfriend's boss's birthday today, so David made a request for some German choc. cupcakes - (Mr. Amundson's fave!). I've vaguely heard of it before, but I never really saw or tasted it, but it was a great time to try!

So, I first baked chocolate cupcakes - first time baking chocolate cake from scratch - and lemme tell ya, the flavor is ALWAYS better when it's from scratch!

I used to LOVE the easy cake mixes, and honestly, that's where my love for baking first began in high school. (that is, after the Easy Bake Oven - but that one was a huge letdown.)
But once I started baking from scratch, the cake mixes taste too eggy to me now.

But anyway, onto the pictures!

Left: Ready to cream the butter + sugar in my KitchenAid;
Right: dry ingredients (cocoa powder, flour, baking soda, salt)

The recipe calls for buttermilk, but the suggested alternative is using milk with some lemon juice!  It creates a chemical reaction that makes the milk ... curdle? and gives it a buttermilky flavor.
(science shout-out --> PRECIPITATION REACTION of the protein casein in milk - acid+base reaction, i'm assuming)
BUT, I did not know this would happen, so I completely FREAKED out when I was pouring the milk mixture into the batter because I thought my milk was spoiled!  But I realized, that was supposed to happen! - who knew!

Delicious final product: YUM.

The chocolate cake recipe from scratch makes the chocolate taste much deeper and richer, so I loved that.


Now it was onto the topping that makes german chocolate what it is:

Heated mixture of evaporated milk, brown sugar, butter, coconut, and pecans

Allow the topping to cool and then glop it on!

German Chocolate Cupcake!

And there we have it!
Happy Birthday Mr. Amundson!
Hope everyone at Minuteman Transport enjoyed them! =)