Marbled Nutella Cupcakes

I love Nutella, but we haven't had a jar of the stuff at home for the longest time. This is because we discovered store-brand dark chocolate spread, which is less sweet and has a more intense chocolate flavour. Since then, we kind of forgot all about the hazelnutty goodness of Nutella. Fast forward to a few months ago, when my boyfriend decided to pick up a jar for his dorm room. Having rediscovered how wonderful it is, I would have a slice of bread with some Nutella whenever I visited him. Eventually he donated what's left of his jar to me, and I was able to eat Nutella with bread whenever I wanted. :)

These cupcakes are a request from him, and I happily obliged. I had come across the recipe for it on she bakes & she cooks years ago before I even expressed an interest in baking, and I made a mental note to try, but it never materialized (partly because I never had Nutella around the house).


I did not notice that the recipe calls for no liquid ingredients (other than eggs) until I saw how thick the batter was. This made it a little hard to swirl, but otherwise I had no problems with the batter. Also, unlike regular marble cakes where the chocolate part consists of the batter mixed with chocolate or cocoa powder, in this case, the chocolate part is solely the Nutella dolloped on top of the cake batter and swirled together to create the marbling pattern.

The combination of Nutella and cake is wonderful, as the cake itself is not very sweet, so the nutty chocolate sweetness from the Nutella lends a nice contrast. I'm not sure if I like the cake on its own because it's a tad on the dry side (as well as a little bland), but it definitely works for this recipe since the Nutella is what gives the cupcakes their distinct flavour. The most important thing is that the requester liked them a lot!

Nutella Cupcakes
recipe from Baking Bites
yields about 20 cupcakes

140 gr (10 tbsp) unsalted butter, softened
3/4 cup granulated sugar
3 large eggs, at room temperature
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 tsp salt
2 tsp baking powder
Nutella or other brands of chocolate hazelnut spread

1. Preheat oven to 325ºF. Line muffin tins with cupcake liners.

2. Cream the butter and sugar until light, about 2 minutes. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing until the egg is fully incorporated after each addition. Add vanilla extract.

3. Stir in flour, salt, and baking powder until everything is mixed well and no flour remains.

4. Fill the muffin tins with the batter, about 3/4 full. Then add about 1 tsp of Nutella on top of the batter. Swirl the two together to create a marbled design; don't over swirl.

5. Bake for 20 minutes; test for doneness using a toothpick or skewer. Cool completely on a wire rack.

Take 2 of One-Bowl Vanilla Cupcakes... in Cake Form!

It's final exam season now, and one of my favourite ways to procrastinate is by looking at food blogs, which in turn makes me want to eat. I happened to be looking at Annie's Eats and the delicious treats on her site made me drool inside, so I decided to whip something up. I made some more ganache yesterday to use up leftover heavy cream that was expiring soon, and I wanted to use it as a glaze so I decided to make the one-bowl cupcakes again. Halfway through mixing the batter, I decided I was too lazy to spoon the batter into individual cupcake liners, so I pulled out an 8-inch square pan and poured the batter straight in without greasing or lining with parchment paper (sorry, I was just being way too lazy). Also, this time I used buttermilk as per the original recipe.

(I apologize for the picture quality!)

I was worried that it would result in a different taste than the previous one I made using yogurt, but overall the taste and smell were identical to the cupcake version. However, I don't think this recipe works as well in cake form because it's a lot better in smaller portions, and the cupcake version develops a lovely crust (like muffin tops) which is missing in the cake version. I also found it to be a little greasy, and I think I prefer cakes with butter, which this one lacks. I'll try an actual yellow cake recipe next time, which I imagine would taste better as a large cake (as it should).

Accidentally Awesome One-Bowl Vanilla Cupcakes

For some reason, I was on a baking roll last week and baked 4 times within 7 days, which never happened before. On Saturday I took a shot at making macarons, and I had leftover ganache, so the next day I decided to make something to use it up. Since I didn't have the greatest success with my macarons (more on that on my next post), I decided to practice my piping using the leftover ganache on some cupcakes. The only easy cupcake recipe I had was Martha Stewart's recipe for one-bowl chocolate cupcakes, but I didn't feel like having more chocolate so I thought I'd do some experimentation and turn them into vanilla ones.

The only kinds of cupcakes I've ever made prior to this have been all chocolatey, so this was new to me. At first I thought it would be as simple as just taking out the cocoa powder out of the recipe, but since the amount was quite crucial to the consistency of the batter, I had to replace it with another dry ingredient, and I chose to use plain old flour. The recipe also calls for buttermilk, but I didn't feel like making some (by adding some vinegar to milk), I used the plain yogurt leftover from making the upside down cake in the previous post. Yogurt works just as well as buttermilk in creating the moist texture of cakes, and I'm glad I used it because the flavour really came through. Since I wanted a strong vanilla flavour, I added more vanilla extract to the batter. I wish I had vanilla beans; I think that would be a nice addition to reinforce the vanilla taste.


As I was mixing the batter, I really wasn't sure how these cupcakes would turn out, although I knew it couldn't be all that bad since I didn't change too many things. Fortunately, what came out of the oven really blew me away! The cupcakes were very moist and had the pleasant smell of yogurt and vanilla, and it was sweeter than I expected even though I used less sugar than what the original recipe calls for. The absence of the overpowering chocolate really let the other ingredients shine.


Since my original intention was to practice piping on these cupcakes, I did just that, and I must say I need to practice a lot more. But regardless of how ugly they may look, they still tasted awesome, and I found the ganache to be a very nice contrast against the plain vanilla flavour of the cupcakes. This mistake is definitely a keeper!

Accidentally Awesome One-Bowl Vanilla Cupcakes
adapted from Martha Stewart
makes about 17 cupcakes

Dry ingredients:
2 cups all-purpose flour
scant 1 1/2 cups sugar
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp salt

Wet ingredients:
2 large eggs
3/4 cup warm water
3/4 cup plain yogurt
3 tbsp canola (or vegetable) oil
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1. Preheat oven to 350ºF. Line a muffin tin with cupcake liners.

2. Sift together all the dry ingredients in a large bowl. Add all the wet ingredients, and mix until smooth. Make sure to scrape the bottom and sides of the bowl to ensure everything is mixed well.

3. Pour the batter into the muffin tin, filling each liner about 2/3 full. Bake for 20-23 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the cupcake comes out clean. Let cool completely on a cooling rack.

Chocolate Ganache
recipe from David Lebovitz

1/2 cup heavy cream
2 tsp light corn syrup (I used Lyle's Golden Syrup)
120 gr chopped bittersweet chocolate
1 tbsp butter, cut into pieces

Heat the cream with the corn syrup in a small saucepan. When the edges of the cream start to boil, turn off the heat and add the chopped chocolate. Stir until smooth, and add the butter. Cool before using.