Nutella Cupcakes & Bad Puns

Today is my husband’s 32nd birthday…and I’ve completely spoiled him the last 2 years for his birthday. For his 30th, I threw him a surprise party in which we asked each guest to bring a bottle of wine (in an attempt to provide him with a bottle for each year lived, we came close!) For his 31st, I celebrated by gifting him with the “31 Flavors of Ryan”. I should do an entire post on this, because it was a lot of fun! I created a gift/explanation of things I appreciated about Ryan that matched a different flavor of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream. He received one each day during the month of March in a variety of ways. I’ll make a note to add a post on this…perhaps while twiddling my thumbs waiting for Allie to arrive. =)

This year…I told him I was taking a break from the extravagant, particularly since I’m due with his daughter 2 days following his birthday. But, I didn’t want his birthday to go entirely uncelebrated, so I made the following cupcakes for a small group of friends. I told him to admit that he loved the cornball pun!! Anyhow, the cupcakes turned out pretty tasty, so here’s the recipe. (I also made box yellow cupcakes with chocolate frosting in case there were people with an aversion to Nutella).  Nutella Frosted Cupcakes

10 T butter, softened

3/4 c. white sugar

3 eggs

1/2 tsp. vanilla

1 3/4 c. sifted flour

1/4 tsp. salt

2 tsp. baking powder

Nutella, approx. 1/3 cup

DIRECTIONS: Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Line 12 muffin tins with paper liners. Cream together butter and sugar until light, 2 minutes. (and yes, I realize this picture is slightly suggestive…thank you mixer!)

Add in eggs one at a time, until fully incorporated. Don’t worry if the batter doesn’t look smooth. (Sorry, I forgot to take a picture here before adding in the dry ingredients.) Add vanilla. Stir in flour, salt and baking powder until batter is uniform and no flour remains.  Fill each muffin liner with batter. They should be 3/4 full, and the dough IS thick. Top each cake with 1 1/2 tsp. Nutella. “Swirl” the Nutella in. This will be a bit tricky since the batter is so thick. I used a toothpick. Bake for 20 minutes. Remove to a wire rack to cool completely. Gotta appreciate new recipes! Go get creative and try something new in the kitchen yourself.