Easy Dutch Chocolate Cupcakes & What To Do When You Run Out of Icing Sugar

I had a milestone birthday last week (and no, I won’t be telling you my age. I like some mystery in our blogging relationship, dear reader!) and one of my colleagues gave a present. Best present ever, because it was chocolate sprinkles that she picked up in a local Dutch goods store! Naturally, I had to bake with them, so I baked up some Easy Dutch Chocolate Cupcakes!

Are you familiar with chocolate sprinkles? I’m not talking about the chocolate sprinkles sold in North America for baking, but the real Dutch chocolate ‘hail’ (chocolade hagel) that generations of Dutch children have grown up eating with bread and butter. Sound too decadent to give to a child? Well, I remember my grade school teacher talking about how her mom would give her a slice of bread with a chunk of chocolate, before the era of Nutella. And if parents will feed Nutella to their kids, well, chocolate ‘hail’ is the same! Except way more fun because you get to sprinkle the ‘hail’ on your buttered bread yourself. And as a child, that’s so. much. fun! And the deliciousness of bread buttered with chocolate sprinkles has to be tasted to be believed.

I decided to try and recipe that deliciousness in cupcake form. I used a chocolate cupcake instead of a slice of bread, and buttercream instead of butter, but the chocolate ‘hail’? No substitutions for that — it was imported straight from Holland!

Have I teased you enough by describing the lusciousness of this cupcake? Shall we get to baking? (And more importantly, to eating?) Yes? I concur!

EASY DUTCH CHOCOLATE CUPCAKES W/ CHOCOLATE BUTTERCREAM & CHOCOLATE SPRINKLES

You’ll need

• 1 batch chocolate cupcake batter (my hands-down-best-ever recipe is Hershey’s Perfectly Chocolate Cake recipe. Only recipe I ever use.)
• 1 batch chocolate buttercream (see recipe below)
• 1 c. chocolate sprinkles

Bake cupcakes in liners in a muffin tray in a 350 degree oven for 20 minutes, or until the tops spring back when lightly tapped. Let cool.

Ice with chocolate buttercream. There at two ways to do this: you can use a Wilton 1M tip (my favourite way to ice) or, if like me, you’ve misplaced your 1M tip, just use a knife to spread the buttercream roughly on the top of the muffin.

If you’ve piped your icing on, sprinkle your chocolate hail on top of the icing in a random and pretty design. And you’re done!

If you’ve spread your icing on, like me, take the iced cupcake, turn it upside down, and roll the top in a bowl of chocolate hail. Simple, elegant, and oh, so yummy to eat! If you make this recipe, let me know in the comments which technique you used!

CHOCOLATE BUTTERCREAM

• Take one batch of my The Only Buttercream Recipe You’ll Ever Need, and add 1/2 c. cocoa powder. Are you a super-duper chocolate lover? Add 1 c. cocoa powder. Are you a chocolate fiend? Add 1 1/2 c. cocoa powder. Not chocolatey enough? Forget buttercream and just use straight ganache, my friend!

I’ve mentioned often enough that I’m the Queen of Substitutions, and here is a case in point! I ran out of icing sugar, but needed one more cup to finish this recipe. What to do? It’s time for a…

Kitchen Hack

Take 1 c. regular white sugar, and blend it in a blender for 5 minutes, shaking occasionally, until as finely ground as you can get it. This won’t be exactly like icing sugar, but definitely more like icing sugar than regular sugar, so it’s a good hack to use in a pinch.

Wasn’t using regular sugar and turning it into icing sugar, a clever way to finish the recipe? I mean, one can’t stop baking in the middle of a baking storm! Cooking creativity cannot be stifled!

Want more easy substitutions? Subscribe to my blog and receive a copy of my e-book, This for That: Easy Kitchen Swaps and Hacks via email! How to sign up? Enter your email addy in the orangey-red bar at the top of the blog, or look at the right top of the blog and sign up there. Free kitchen tips: who doesn’t want that?

Next Post: I’ve been working on a Extra-Chocolatey Nanaimo Bar recipe, in honour of Canada’s 150th birthday this year, and it’s just about done! So stay tuned for a Nanaimo Bar recipe that’ll knock your socks off! They’re so addictive, btw. So, so, very deliciously addictive! 

Linking Up at Meal Plan Monday! And at Happiness is Homemade!