Chocolate, Peanut Butter, Christmas...

OH OH OH! That's Ho Ho Ho backwards because I am OH so sleepy today. How was your Christmas?? Was it awesome? Or epic? Or boring? Did you get all of the great swag you asked for?

Mine was wonderful. I was so tired on Monday by the time we got back from Petoskey that I fell right asleep. And yes I'm one of those grown ups that will toss and turn all night on Christmas Eve because I'm to excited to sleep.

My family has this really great tradition where we wake up, open our stockings, have breakfast and then we get to open presents. This year I tried to bypass the breakfast part because I wasn't hungry but my mother said we would have to wait for gifts until I was. You bet your buttons I got to cooking! After breakfast we went to the barn to feed Miss Muffin and then we finally got home to open gifts.

This is what we look like when we go to the barn on Christmas (we stay in our jammies all day!). Justin got new Muck boots that he was so excited to try out in the snow. 

I got all sorts of really great stuff on Christmas. One of the jokes being that Justin got me a Creme Brulee torch and my mother got us 2 first aid kits. :) She's smart like that. I also got 5 or 6 really awesome new aprons!! I love aprons. I collect them actually, but I wear them all the time. That's going to have to be a new post in itself. I want to show them off! 

Back to the cupcakes: ----

I made Dark Chocolate Peanut butter cupcakes for a friend to take to work. She works at UPS on the early morning shift loading packages to make sure we all get our Christmas goodies on time (thank you thank you thank you!!!!). They were ecstatic to have a sweet treat so early in the morning. 

Here's the cheater version. :) It was sort of a last minute thing and I was being a bum. You don't always have to make things from scratch to make them taste homemade. :)

I started with this. A box of cake mix. GASP! Blah blah blah, yes sometimes I'm a lazy cheater but there are ways to make them taste more homemade. 

So read the normal directions - add 1 more egg, use milk instead of water and melted butter instead of oil. Voila! Better boxed cake mix. 

See, 4 eggs :)

Also, if you don't have one of these super awesome spatula blades for your KitchenAid you must get one. And if you don't have a KitchenAid you need one of those too. I use mine for everything.

I even took a break for some creative photo time.

 I also caught Justin playing his new drum shirt. All those little drums and symbols make noise and there is a speaker box sewn into the shirt. Pretty cool until you hear the racket it makes! 

 Back to the cupcakes - mix it real good. Scoop 3/4 full until your lined cupcake pans and bake. I use a 2 oz. ice cream type scoop that I got at Gordon foods. it's really handy. 

More random pictures. This is my Christmas apron :)

On to the frosting. Get out your peanut butter. I use so much of it in my house that I buy it like this. And I love it! The other day I wanted to put peanut butter on my pizza but didn't because Justin thought I was being weird. 

Mix your room temp butter & peanut butter together and then slowly add your powdered sugar. I have no measurements for these because I wing it. always. Sorry. 

After your cupcakes cool and your frosting is mixed you get to pipe them. I use a Wilton 1M tip. One of the giant ones. I like the shape they give. 

After all is said and done your cuppy cakes should come out looking something like this!

 I didn't have chocolate syrup for drizzle so I melted some chocolate chips in the microwave & put them in a Ziploc bag to drizzle.  Then I topped them with mini baby cute adorable reeses cups. 

This is how I like to eat my cupcakes. I rip the bottom off, squish it on top and eat it like a sammich. Nom!

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