Here in rainy Seattle it is hard to plan any type of fun or typical outdoor Memorial Day activity. We wished we were having a day at the beach, a BBQ, or even camping...but this was not the case. Instead, we brought the nostalgia of the outdoors in with this week's addition to 'making things that taste good'...a S'mores Cupcake.
Making the perfect S'more is never as easy as it sounds or as you remember it, but we recall the times that we have made S'mores with our family and friends with such fondness that we are tempted to make them again and again.
My experience usually happens something like this...I've lit the fire and let it burn down, found and whittled the perfect roasting stick, and spent an intense few minutes focusing solely on making the most perfectly toasted marshmallow. Then one of two things usually happens...it bursts into flames or it falls of the stick into the dirt. So, you repeat the process a few more times and when you have finally roasted a marshmallow that you think will just have to do, you put it between the graham crackers and chocolate and take a bite. Now, I remember a S'more as a pile of something ooey and gooey, melted and warm, toasted and crunchy... but usually the chocolate never melts, the marshmallow is still a ball of rubber on the inside, and the graham crackers are so dry I'm glad I still have half a can of soda sitting on the table from dinner. So, what now?
While researching my recipe for this week I came across A LOT of S'more Cupcake recipes. The challenge this week was picking the right one. I ended up using bits and pieces from a bunch of different recipes to come up with the perfect S'more experience.
First, I made a graham cracker crust in the bottom of each cupcake liner. I put these in the oven for just 5 minutes so the crust was a little crunchy and would hold together nicely. When I took them out of the oven, I put my chocolate batter right on top of the crust in the liner. In keeping with the tradition of the S'more I used this cupcake recipe from the Hershey's website.
http://www.hersheys.com/recipes/recipes/detail.asp?id=184
While the cupcakes were cooling, I made a very fluffy meringue. I had thought about doing a marshmallow buttercream, but I thought it might turn out a bit too stiff and rubbery. My hope was to have something super soft and gooey. After piping on the meringue, I put the cupcakes on a cookie sheet and set them in the oven with the broiler on. NOTE: You really need to be sitting on the floor watching these the whole time. They will start to burn in an instant (kinda like roasting a marshmallow). I'll post two pics of my cupcakes this week. One was left under the broiler longer than the other. It's a good thing some people like a their marshmallows just a little burnt.
I topped this off with a piece of Hershey's chocolate stuck right into the meringue. They turned out looking great.
And they tasted even better. I really liked this cupcake. Granted it was a little sticky and very messy to eat, it was exactly the way I want to remember having a S.more on Memorial Day Weekend.
Overall rating: 4.5 out of 5
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