Sybaritic Diversions

10/22/2005 - Choc-nut Cups for a Children's Party

Posted in Baking

I don't really like repeating recipes once I've featured them in my blog, but there's one particular recipe that keeps making a comeback: the one for Choc-nut Cups.

If you read the original Sybaritic Diversions blog over at Friendster Blogs or my previous blog (Sub)Urbanista, you may already have encountered these delightful little cupcakes flavored with peanut butter, chocolate, and a hint of caramel. These were based on the recipe for peanut-butter-and-Snickers muffins in Nigella Lawson's How to be a Domestic Goddess, with a few tweaks.

I made a batch of these for a children's party I catered for a couple weeks ago. They joined a lovely spread that consisted of spaghetti with two sauces (tomato eggplant and mushroom cream), three types of mini-pizza (plain cheese, mixed sausage, and spicy mushroom), macaroni and cheese, and miniature chocolate cupcakes.

This particular batch, however, was made with Cadbury Picnic Chocettes rather than Snickers bars. The crisped rice in the Picnic made for an interesting textural contrast within the soft, buttery cupcake. As seen above, the contents of each pack of Picnic Chocettes were quartered before being thrown into the batter.

Interestingly enough, it was the adults who scarfed down these babies as opposed to the kids who settled for plain chocolate cupcakes!

Choc-Nut Cups

250 grams all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons baking powder
3 tablespoons brown sugar
3 tablespoons white sugar
6 tablespoons chunky peanut butter (I used Lady's Choice Super Chunky for this.)
60 grams salted butter
175 mL low-fat milk
1 egg, beaten
2 packs of Cadbury Picnic Chocettes, contents quartered

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees/Gas Mark 6. Line two 12-cup mini-muffin trays with paper baking cups.

Sift together the flour, baking powder, and brown sugar; set aside. Melt the butter with the milk in your microwave oven; 1 1/2 minutes on HIGH should do the trick. Allow to cool for a few seconds before whisking in the egg to make a thin custard; set aside. Cut the peanut butter into the flour mixture until it resembles coarse crumbs. Stir in the custard and mix until you have a gooey-textured batter; add the chopped Picnic Chocettes.

Put half-teaspoonfuls of the mixture into the prepared muffin cups and bake for 10 - 15 minutes. Repeat this step until you've used up all the batter. This recipe makes 80 bite-sized cupcakes.