TWD: Chocolate-Chocolate Cupcakes

All packed up to go in my spiffy travel case

This week's selection was chosen by Clara of I Heartfood4thought and it provided a lot of excitement in our household (yay chocolate!). I did not get around to decorating my cupcakes in any spectacular Halloween fashion but I cannot wait to check out the blogs and see the creativity that everyone else came up with! I had big hopes for decorating them with a Penn State theme as I was bringing them over to a Penn State viewing party (like the team, the cupcakes were classics without any extra ornamentation!) :-)

My cupcakes were done in about 18 minutes and I was glad I checked early because there were so many reports of them being dry. I added nutella to half of my cupcakes which was a tremendous addition!

The lone survivor!

Yes, they do look dry now, but it was 2 days later! :-)

TWD: Caramel Peanut-Topped Brownie (Cup) Cake

Tammy of Wee Treats by Tammy picked a good one this week- Caramel Peanut-Topped Brownie Cake!

I decided to take the recipe and make cupcakes out of it to see how it would turn out. I knew if we had a whole brownie cake laying around it would be bad news for me & my husband (and besides, who doesn't want a cupcake?) :-)

The cupcakes turned out very nicely- except they were a tiny bit dry. I probably should have cut the baking time by 1-2 minutes (I baked them for about 25 minutes). The caramel took almost 20 minutes to make but was ferociously delicious! I can't wait to have an excuse just to make the caramel again!

One important tip I learned about caramel: just because the metal spoon that is sitting in caramel isn't hot, doesn't mean the caramel on the spoon won't burn the roof of your mouth off!

I made 3 different types of cupcakes: plain, caramel covered & peanut/caramel topped and the caramel only were the most popular. Really this was a great recipe, I'm so glad I made it into cupcakes, they were the perfect size! If you decide to make the cupcakes, fill the cups no more than half way because while baking the cupcakes will grow big time otherwise (unless you want huge cupcakes and there is no harm in that!)

TWD: Dimply Plum Cake

YUM!!!!!!!!!

Wow!!! This was so much better than I would ever have imagined! This is another one of those times when I am very grateful to belong to this group- I don't think I would have made this recipe without a little nudging. Boy am I glad (and so is everyone else that ate it) that I did!!

Big thanks to Michelle of Bake-en for this selection. This was a great diversion from all of the delicious cookies this past week and has become an instant classic/favorite of ours.

Before!                                       After!             

I made this with 8 Italian plum/prunes, which just happened to be on sale and the total cost was less than $1 which was an enormous score given the usually skyrocketing prices of produce. The only change I made to the recipe was not using the cardamon (because I didn't have any) but I would like to try it for the next time. Everything about the cake was so perfect- the plums were outrageous. The cooking time was off by about 10 minutes though and I'm guessing that may be because of the dish I baked the cake in. Either way, it was really, really delicious!!!! We managed to save some for the next day just to see how the taste would change. It was still really delicious. I can't wait to run out and get some of those Italian plums again!

I'll be taking off next week because I will be at my alma mater cheering on my Nittany Lions along with 110,000 of my closest friends but I am looking forward to seeing how the creme brulee comes out!

TWD: Chocolate Chunkers

Thanks to Claudia of Fool for Food for selecting this week's recipe, the unbelievably chocolatey chocolate chunkers. 

I have to be honest, given the amount of ingredients (chocolate chips, peanuts, raisins, etc) that were going into the cookies I was worried they were going to be too "full" to be tasty. I even considered omitting the peanuts or the raisins just to be on the safe side. Then I ended up giving in and the only change I made to the recipe was reducing the amount of peanuts to 1 cup.

The ultimate verdict was 2 thumbs up all around- even my Dad indulged and ate a bunch even though he has been very conscious about reducing the amount of sugar in his diet (maybe the cookies were too good then?) :-) I even liked the raisins and how the moistness played off of the crunchiness of the peanuts and the chips. Next time I'll cut back a little bit more on the peanuts but they definitely will be made again!