Martha Monday - Candy Filled Brownie Cupcakes

Welcome back to the second installment of Martha Monday. Today we will be discussing the Candy Filled Brownie Cupcakes. In Martha's cookbook, she calls them Mint Filled Brownie Cupcakes, and they use a bag of York Peppermint Patties. I did not have Peppermint Patties, but I did have a bag of peanut butter cups left over from Halloween. Rather than buy an additional bag of candy and continue to have Halloween leftovers, I decided to use the peanut butter cups in place of the peppermint patties.

1) Preheat your oven to 350° and line a standard muffin tin with paper liners. (Any color will do this week.)

2) These brownie cupcakes do not require many ingredients. You will need:
8 ounces of bittersweet or semisweet chocolate
1 stick of butter, cut into 1/2 pieces, room temperature
1 cup granulated sugar
3/4 teaspoon salt
3 large eggs
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup unsweetend Dutch-process cocoa powder
12 small candies (Martha says peppermint patties, but I used peanut butter cups.)



3) Place chocolate in butter in a heatproof bowl over a pan of simmering water. Stir occasionally just until melted, about 4-5 minutes.


4) This is what mine looked like after a few minutes. It had not melted yet!


5) Remove bowl from heat. Whisk in sugar and salt until mixture is smooth. Whisk in eggs to combine.


6) Gently whisk in flour and cocoa just until smooth. Do not overmix.


7) Spoon 1 heaping tablespoon of batter into the bottom of each muffin liner.


8) Place one candy on top and gently press into batter.


9) Top with 2 more tablespoons of batter, covering the candy completely.


10) Bake, rotating tin halfway. When a cake tester comes out clean (above the candy) brownie cupcakes are done, about 35 minutes.


11) Transfer pan to a wire rack to cool completely before removing cupcakes.


These were pretty good. They were a little thick and dry for my taste, but they were still pretty good. It went well with a glass of milk! It probably would have been better with the peppermint patties, but as a way to use up leftover candy, it was not bad at all!

Tune in next week for a special Thanksgiving-themed Martha Monday!