Is there anything better than a personal portion of cake? Cupcakes are practically paper-wrapped bundles of love. Whenever I make cupcakes they disappear in no time, they also make brilliant gifts for guests to take away. This recipe is one I came up with years ago for a friend’s birthday. I give you my Hidden Oreo Cupcakes.
When I call them hidden this refers to the full Oreo that is hidden at the bottom. The cake is a really chocolatey sponge, sitting atop an Oreo covered with cookies and cream buttercream. To have enough space for cake, Oreo and frosting I use muffin cases. I also use a muffin tin – slightly deeper than a cupcake tray.
Baking cakes properly is all about oven temperature and timing. The traditional test – and the one so many people will tell you to do – is to take a skewer or cocktail stick and pierce the centre of the cake. If it comes out with clean it is cooked if not it needs longer. Now before you rush off to stab your cake through the middle I disagree with this test. If you skewer the middle and it is completely cooked by the time it comes to eat the cake, it will be over cooked and, the edges especially, will be dry. For cupcakes, I pierce halfway from edge to centre and if clean I will pull them out of the oven and cool them in the tin. The residual heat will continue cooking the cakes and give you an unbelievably moist cake.
This batter is a wet batter and therefore can make portioning difficult. I use my ice cream scoop and put two scoops of the wet batter into each case. You want to fill 2 thirds full. This leaves room for rising as well as buttercream. Bake these cupcakes for 20 – 22 minutes at 160°C Fan or 180°C Conventional. During this time you make the buttercream and fill the piping bag and do the washing up.
The piping bags I use are silicone and reusable. You just wash them out dry them and they are ready to go again. This helps reduce waste and honestly I find you can grip the silicone slightly better than a disposable version. I recommend this piping bag. If you are piping this butter cream you need to make sure your Oreo crumbs are very fine. If you have large chunks there is the chance that they will block your nozzle, making piping almost impossible. So bash of blitz to a fine dust. As this cake is so moist and hides an Oreo at the bottom I don’t over do it with the buttercream. This buttercream is sweet and a little goes a long way. Of course you do not need to pipe this butter cream you can just as easily use an offset spatula to spread the topping.
Every time I introduce someone to my chocolate cupcakes, whether they are concealing a cookie or not, they are instantly converted. Without fail someone will ask what the secret is or for the recipe. For me the secret is a good quality cocoa powder. So long as the cocoa is a good rich one then it really doesn’t matter if you use butter or margarine. Whichever you use must be softened so you can beat it into the mix smoothly. For more tips on baking cakes and another great recipe take a look at my Red Velvet Cake.
If you try these Hidden Oreo Cupcakes I’d love to hear what you thought in the comments below. You can share your pictures on social media with me. Tag me on Instagram @cubbinthekitchen or use the #CUBBintheKitchen to be featured in my stories.
Hidden Oreo Cupcakes
Ingredients
For the Cakes
- 175 ml Boiling Water
- 50 grams Cocoa Powder
- 2 Eggs
- 1 tsp Vanilla Extract
- 12 Oreos or equivalent chocolate sandwich biscuit
- 175 grams Plain flour All Purpose
- 0.5 tsp Bicarbonate of Soda
- 0.5 tsp Salt
- 225 grams Caster Sugar
- 175 grams Unsalted butter or Margarine Softened
For the Buttercream
- 6 tbsp Unsalted Butter
- 450 grams Icing Sugar
- 3 tbsp Almond Milk or any liquid
- 5 Oreos
Instructions
To Make the Cakes
- Preheat the over to 160°C Fan or 180°C Conventional.Line a muffin tin with muffin cases and place 1 Oreo in each.
- In a jug whisk together 175ml of Boiling Water with the Cocoa Powder and set aside to cool to room temperature.(To speed this up I put it in a sink of cold water so the water comes up the sides to just above the cocoa line and whisk gently to cool quickly)
- In a bowl combine the Plain Flour, Bicarbonate of Soda, Salt and Caster Sugar.(I sieve the Flour, Bicarb & Salt and then using a whisk mix the sugar in to have an even crumb)
- Once the Cocoa and Water mixture is at room temperature add the Vanilla Extract and both Eggs, Whisk until smooth.
- Add the Butter (or Margarine) to the Flour, Sugar etc and pour in 1 third of the Cocoa mixture. Stir together until smooth.
- Add another third of the Cocoa and beat it in.Repeat with the final third.
- Pour into cases engulfing the Oreo at the bottom. you want to fill the cases to 2 thirds full.Bake in the oven for 20 – 22 minutes.Once the cakes are springy and remove and let them cool in the pan.
To Make the Buttercream
- Scrape out the white filling of each of the 5 Oreos and set aside.Place the Black discs of the Oreos into a chopper and blitz to a very fine crumb.(You could put these in a bag and bash if you wish)
- In a bowl beat the Butter and the white filling from the Oreos until smooth and creamy.Sieve in 150g the Icing sugar and beat until combined.Add 1 tbsp Almond Milk.Repeat with 150g Icing Sugar and 1 tbsp Almond Milk.
- Add the Final 100g Icing Sugar, the final 1 tbsp Almond Milk and the 4 tbsp Oreo crumbs.Mix until thoroughly combined and pipe-able, or spreadable if you prefer.Adorn the top of each cooled cupcake with the Oreo buttercream and if you have crumbs left over scatter them over the top also.
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