Pinch Me I Must Be Dreaming! Thin Mint Chocolate Cupcakes

I had some thin mints left over from the cookies and just HAD to make a cupcake. I thought it would be tasty to crush cookies and put it in cupcake batter then make a green vanilla-mint frosting! These are soooooooo good if I do say so myself! In the words of one of my roomates "these are too die for!"

Make it even easier by buying boxed cake mix! I decided to make a devils food cupcake recipe from Martha Stewart and add in some mint extract myself and a vanilla frosting I found somewhere on allrecipes.com, I decided to add the mint for the sake of the thin-mint theme.

Pinch Me I must Be Dreaming: Thin Mint Cupcakes

A devils food chocolate cake with crushed thin mints baked in. It's topped with a green vanilla-mint buttercream frosting, green sprinkles and a chunk of a thin mint cookie.

Ingredients:

3/4 cup unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder
3/4 cup hot water
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 1/4 teaspoons coarse salt
1 1/2 cups (3 sticks) unsalted butter
2 1/4 cups sugar
4 large eggs, room temperature
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 teaspoon mint extract
1 cup sour cream, room temperature
1 sleeve thin mint cookies, crushed
Vanilla-mint frosting (recipe follows)
Green Sprinkles

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line standard muffin tins with paper liners. Whisk together cocoa and hot water until smooth. In another bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt.

Melt butter with sugar in a saucepan over medium-low heat, stirring to combine. Remove from heat, and pour into a mixing bowl. With an electric mixer on medium-low speed, beat until mixture is cooled, 4 to 5 minutes. Add eggs, one at a time, beating until each is incorporated, scraping down sides of bowl as needed. Add vanilla, mint, then cocoa mixture, and beat until combined. Reduce speed to low. Add flour mixture in two batches, alternating with the sour cream, and beating until just combined after each. Crush 1 sleeve of thin mints and add to the batter.

Divide batter evenly among lined cups, filling each three- quarters full. Bake, rotating tins halfway through, until a cake tester inserted in centers comes out clean, about 20 minutes. Transfer tins to wire racks to cool 15 minutes; turn out cupcakes onto racks and let cool completely. Cupcakes can be stored overnight at room temperature, or frozen up to 2 months, in airtight containers.

Vanilla-Mint Frosting

Ingredients:
4 cups confectioners' sugar
1/2 cup butter, softened
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 teaspoon mint extract
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
4 tablespoons milk
6 thin mint cookies, cut into quarters
Green food coloring

Directions:

In a large bowl, cream 1 1/3 cups sugar with 1/2 cup butter or margarine, and salt. Blend extract, 2 tablespoons milk, and remaining sugar into mixture. Gradually stir remaining milk into frosting until desired spreading consistency is reached. Stir in desired amount of green food coloring and stir.

Frost each cupcake with frosting. Top with green sprinkles and a quarter chunk of thin mint cookie

Serve immediately or wait to top the cupcakes with cookies right before serving

Happy St Pattys Day!