S'mores Cupcakes

It's time for the February Martha Stewart Cupcake Club post. If you've been following along, you know that all the cupcakes I've made for the club thus far have been a hit. There were a few that seemed like they would be a flop, but came out awesome in the end and totally surprised me!

However, I knew the day would come when I would not be so lucky. It pains me to say that this month's cupcake did indeed turn out to be a HUGE flop! But now that I know you guys enjoy reading about my various kitchen disasters, I don't feel so bad posting about this one. tee hee. (If you missed it, you can read about the Lamington Debacle HERE.)


They were, um... supposed to be S'mores, but in the form of a cupcake, I guess. They seemed super promising, like they'd be delicious. I mean, you can't go wrong with graham crackers and chocolate, right? WRONG.

Geeze, I promised you guys I'd post something awesome this weekend in my Wednesday Giveaway post, thinking that I would make these on Friday...but I guess I spoke too soon. I just assumed that these would turn out to be awesome. hehe. So, I'm sorry to disappoint! But now I'm stuck. I gotta post about these before the 15th of the month, so it's not like I can replace it with something else. So I guess you're suck with this entry until early next week. The good news is that I will announce the winners of the giveaway tomorrow! Something to look forward to! =)

Ok here goes: on to these disappointing cupcakes...

(1) The "Graham" Cupcakes

The recipe called for something I'd never heard of: Graham flour. This is where it all went wrong, little did I know. The very first step! It was doomed from the very beginning. Humph!

There was a blurb about it being available at "health food stores." Lo and behold, I found it in the baking aisle of Whole Foods. Was it supposed to be in "wheat" form? Did it have a "white" form like flour? Heck if I should know. The "wheat" variety was the only kind they had. So I went with it.


Upon initial inspection, it seemed harmless enough. It was thicker than regular flour- it was grainy, kinda like wheat flour, I suppose. And it didn't smell like anything in particular.


Anyway, you're supposed to mix it all together with the other dry ingredients: flour, baking powder, salt, and cinnamon.


Next, in a separate bowl, cream together brown sugar, honey, and butter. Ick. It ended up being waaaaay too sweet! Why would you add 2 cups of sugar and 1/4 cup of honey? Honey is super sweet already as it is! I shoulda known right then to cut out some of the sugar. It nagged at me, but I went with it anyway. I should really trust my instincts more.

Next, add the eggs and vanilla.

Then mix in the flour until well combined.

Ok, here's another thing that really annoyed me: it said to bake at 350 degrees F for 25 minutes, but...


...this is what it looked like after only 22 minutes! They were almost burnt! Good thing I kept an eye on them, sorta. hehe. If I was really paying attention, they wouldn't have turned out to be so brown. Eh, they were still edible, so I guess no harm done.

(2) The Vanilla Swiss Meringue Buttercream

So the recipe called for marshmallow as the frosting. Ew. Marshmallow is really sweet and I only like it on certain things.. in a real s'more, for example, when it's warm and gooey...or homemade rice crispy treats! yum! But I thought: ok, this is going to be nasty when it hardens overnight in the fridge. Do you really want hard marshmallow on your cupcake? I think not.

So I used a basic vanilla flavored Swiss Meringue Buttercream.

(3) Putting it all together

As usual, I used a piping tip to frost the cupcakes. Then I drizzled melted chocolate on top and sprinkled some graham cracker crumbs. Eh, it looked kinda plain. So I came up with another plan of attack...


I used an off-set spatula to create little frosting mounds with a flat surface on top.


Then I dipped the sides in graham cracker and topped it with a little pool of melted chocolate. Hm...there's still something missing, I think.


So I topped them off with little chocolate hearts! Wow, they turned out pretty cute. I was really happy with them until I took my first bite. lol.

Holy cow! These were quite disgusting. Bleh! Not even my super-awesome-fantastic-no-fail Swiss Meringue buttercream could salvage this mess of a cupcake. And no, it wasn't because I messed up on one of the steps, because I am always meticulous when it comes to my cupcakes, you know? The recipe itself was just terrible. In fact, the buttercream was just about the only thing that was delicious and edible.

As I mentioned before, it was WAY too sweet. I felt like I was chugging a jar of honey. The sweetness level was just plain gross. PLUS, it was gritty. (Think back to that gritty graham flour!) Yes, the crumb was not good. It was dense, overly sweet, and gritty! I was so disgusted by them that I didn't even give them away to friends, as I always do with my creations. I'd be too embarrassed to put my name on them. Ew.

Did anyone else think these were gross too??

The recipe really isn't worth posting. So I'm not going to take the time to put it up. If anyone is curious and wants to give it a try, you can email me (jlong10@gmail.com) for the recipe. hehe. I suppose this post is really only good for the eye candy, because at least the pictures are pretty!

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EDIT: After posting, my friend Patricia, left a comment saying that she's tried a different s'mores cupcake recipe from Martha's site that turned out really well. It looked super delicious on her site, ButterYum! I read through the recipe and it actually looks pretty awesome! No weird graham flour stuff! Thanks so much for the excellent tip, Patricia!