Chocolate Marshmallow Goodness Cupcakes

My friend who happens to be a Hershey sales rep recently had a birthday. So I just had to make her some chocolate overload cupcakes! I took some simple recipes and modified them to add even more chocolately goodness. Hershey Girl loved them!
Start with this...

...and end up with these! The lump in the middle is a marshmallow (chocolate vanilla marshmallows to be exact). They look a little sticky here, but once the frosting set up they came out well.

Chocolate Marshmallow Cupcakes

Cupcake Ingredients:

2 C flour

2 C sugar

1/2 t baking powder

1 t baking soda

1 t salt

1/2 C butter

3/4 C water

2 large eggs

3/4 C milk

1 t vanilla

4 oz semi-sweet chocolate chips, melted

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350. Combine all ingredients and mix well in stand mixer for about 3 minutes.

Fill cupcake pans (with liners) about 1/2 full. Bake 20-25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool in pan 10-15 minutes then transfer to wire rack to cool completely. When cool scoop out a small hole in the middle of each cupcake. (I used an apple corer). Insert marshmallows into center of each cupcake.

Frosting Ingredients:

1/2 C butter

2/3 C cocoa

3 C powdered sugar

1/4 C milk

1 t vanilla extract

Directions:

Melt butter and stir in cocoa. Add powdered sugar and milk while beating with mixer. Stir in vanilla. Spread evenly over cupcakes. Frosting may need a little time to firm up. If it is too runny add a little more powdered sugar until it is the desired consistency.

Chili Pepper Oil

Chili pepper oil is my go-to oil for just about anything I'm cooking...but then my husband and I are what some call "chili heads," those weird people who eat habaneros like they're apples. Don't fear, you can make this oil as hot or as mild as you like it. Plus, it's super easy to do.

Start with some dried peppers and olive oil. The pepper type is up to you, I used some Caribbean red hots I grew last year. I always use the pepper seeds. If you want a really mild oil skip the seeds or only use a few. To see how hot certain peppers are you can check out the Scoville scale here. Scoville units range from 0 (bell peppers) to about 1,000,000 (Ghost Pepper, a favorite of mine!)

The next step: add the dried peppers to the olive oil. I used a cute bottle with a seal I found at Crate and Barrell (for only $3.95 too!). Shake it up, let it sit a couple days to infuse the flavor into the oil and you're done!