Guest Blogger Christy from Cupcakes N Cones makes Organic Peppermint Bark Brownie Cupcakes

JavaCupcake Note: This is a guest blog post from Christy at Cupcakes N Cones.  To see what other wonderful organic creations she's made, be sure to visit her site and keep updated with her twitter feed!

Peppermint Bark Cupcake Brownies...or Brownie Cupcakes

I was inspired by my friend on Twitter (@JavaCupcake) to create a holiday cupcake, recipe and all. So I decided on a peppermint bark brownie cupcake, I think they look really really really good.


Here is the recipe I used:

1 2/3 cup soft unsalted organic butter
13 ounces of the best organic bittersweet chocolate (I find everything at Whole Foods and Trader Joes)
6 large organic eggs
1 Tablespoon Vanilla extract
1 2/3 cup organic sugar
1 1/2 cup all purpose flour (organic of course)
1 teaspoon salt

You can pretty much alter any of your favorite brownie recipes or chocolate cake recipes with organic ingredients to make cupcakes/brownies and you can also add nuts to this recipe if you'd like, I chose not to but if I did, I'd probably use 1 1/3 cup chopped walnuts.

Preheat your oven to 350.
Melt butter and chocolate together in a large heavy pan.
In a bowl: beat eggs with vanilla and sugar.
Measure the flour into another bowl and add the salt.
Once the chocolate mixture has melted, let it cool a little before beating in the eggs and vanilla and sugar. Than add nuts and flour or just flour if you aren't using nuts.
Beat until smooth.
I use an ice cream scooper to get the same amount in each cupcake paper. I also make sure the cupcake paper is sprayed with a cooking spray before filling them with batter so the brownies come out easily, if you are using a cake mix, you do not need to spray the cupcake papers.
Bake for about 25 minutes.
Since these are brownies and not cake mix, take them out when it looks dense and gooey because they continue to bake while they cool, if you bake too long you'll get a dry brownie.

This is how they should look:

Next, I melted some white chocolate in the microwave for about a minute until it was nice and creamy. I spooned some chocolate onto the brownie cupcake.

Next, I used some candy canes, unwrapped them and put them inside a ziplock bag (heavier the better or use two) and got out my rolling pin and started to take my frustrations out while crushing the candies to a fine consistency. I sprinkled them on the top and voila, a peppermint bark brownie cupcake is created!