Don't Call It A Cupcake

Little (or widely) known fact: I mother-fucking hate cupcakes. It's not necessarily Cupcake's fault, but they are so damn trendy and so damn pastel and so damn "feminine" that they fill me with rage and make me want to puke. Preferably on a rainbow or a kitten or something that's also supposed to be adorable and marketed to women.

That said, I haven't had my period in something like 6 or 7 weeks and have been exceptionally moody. (No worries, there is no biological way for me to be preggers.) After a heaping bowl of pasta for dinner and several ounces of El Rey 41% discos caoba (milk chocolate discs) for snack, I decided to pour myself a fishbowl of bourbon and ginger-ale and make some of these small, muffin-sized cakes from (where else?) SmittenKitchen.

Dark Chocolate Souffles with White Chocolate Mint Whipped Cream
Adapted from SmittenKitchen.

2 oz. white chocolate
3 oz. heavy cream
1/8 tsp peppermint extract

4 oz. bittersweet and/or semisweet chocolate
6 tbsp butter
1/4 to 1/2 tsp instant espresso or coffee powder
3 large eggs, separated
6 tbsp sugar, separated
 1/4 tsp salt

1. Place white chocolate in a small bowl (it should be able to hold at least 3 cups, though); if using chips you can use them as they are, if not, make sure you finely chop the chocolate first. Place cream in small saucepan on the stove and bring to a simmer. Pour cream over chocolate and wait 1 minute (or longer) for chocolate to melt. Whisk. Add peppermint extract. Whisk again until well combined. Place a piece of plastic wrap on the surface of the mixture and place in the refrigerator (~2 hours) or freezer (~1 hour) until well chilled.

2. Preheat your oven to 350 F and place muffin liners in standard-sized muffin pan.

3. Place butter in small to medium saucepan. Once it has melted enough to form a layer at the bottom, add dry espresso or coffee powder and chocolate (chopped or broken up). Stir briefly until butter is melted and chocolate is almost all melted; remove from heat. Stir occasionally until chocolate is totally melted but do not burn the chocolate. If you do, you'll just have to start over again.

4. Separate eggs into two medium bowls. Add 3 tbsp sugar to the egg yolks and beat with an electric mixture until pale yellow and quite thick (about 3 minutes). Add chocolate mixture and vanilla to yolks and stir until just combined.

5. Beat egg whites with clean, dry beaters (I just rinsed mine and paper-toweled them dry) until soft peaks form. Add remaining sugar to egg whites along with the salt. Beat until medium-firm peaks form. Fold egg white mixture into egg yolk/chocolate mixture in three parts. If you're not sure how to fold, leave a comment and I'll explain it.

Firm Peaks

Soft Peaks

 
6. Add souffle batter to muffin liners evenly across all 12 of them; this should leave them filled about 4/5 of the way to the top. Bake for 15-20 minutes or until a tester comes out with moist crumbs attached.

7. Cool souffles on a cooling rack. They will be falling by the time you get them there and that's fine; in fact, it creates a handy indentation into which to set your whipped cream.

8. Once souffles are cooled, retrieve your chilled cream mixture. Using clean, dry beaters (rinsed and wiped, most likely), whip cream until it's the consistency of ... well ... whipped cream. If you over-whip you'll wind up with butter and while lord knows I'm not one to judge you if you put butter on your souffles, it is something to keep in mind.

9. Place a healthy dollop of whipped cream atop a souffle and scarf it down. I would save the souffles and the cream in separate containers unless you plan to serve them all at once--otherwise just top them as you plan to eat them.

Tips and Tricks
- This is super fast. Not a tip or a trick, but good to know.
- I mixed 2 oz. 70% dark chocolate and 2 oz. semisweet for this and it came out great, but you can stick to one or the other. Milk chocolate would be too sweet and not nearly rich enough.

Serving and Pricing info: Supposedly 12 servings, but I say you eat as many of these at a time as you like. I had all of the ingredients to this already in my kitchen so for me it was FREE, BITCHES.

How was it? Delicious. I've made these before and they never disappoint.