In celebration, we went out to Bovino's (see earlier post), which has become a tradition on our birthdays. It's a Brazilian steak house where you get your meal free when it's your birthday (woohoo, birthday perks!).
I also decided to make him an extra special dessert - Andes Mint Cupcakes.
Basically, they're the most incredible cupcakes ever. They're a chocolate cupcake with a mint-chocolate ganache filling, with a mint butter-cream icing, topped with an andes mint. Yep, that's right, folks. Pure and sweet awesomeness.
Here's the final product:
I know, pure and utter amazingness. I made a few without the chocolate ganache filling since Mr. A likes things to be a little more simple. I know, right? Who would NOT want a glorious creamy minty-chocolaty filling inside a chocolate cupcake?
I didn't realize that it's really a fairly simple process to make ganache-filled cupcakes, though! Essentially, you just bake the cupcakes, make the ganache (which requires melting chocolate with milk and then adding mint extract and powdered sugar and stirring until smooth), then putting the ganache into a pastry bag with a tip, then sticking the tip into the cupcake and squeezing some ganache into the cupcake. Love it.
Also, this is the most successful icing I've ever made. Seriously. And it's so simple. Two sticks of unsalted butter, a package of cream cheese, a full bag of powdered sugar, and some vanilla and mint extract. And using those fancy-looking icing bags with the coupler and metal tips wasn't nearly as hard as I thought it would be. I was supposed to use a different tip, but... this was all I had, and it worked really well! Especially for a first-timer :D
What are you waiting for?! Go bake!
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