BAKED Sunday Mornings: Devil's Food Cupcakes with Angel Frosting

I've been dying for a chance to use these pretty cupcake wrappers, and was excited with the black and white theme of the cupcakes to make extra good use of the b&w damask!
For this recipe, I used TJ's Cocoa Powder and Chocolate disks, and subsituted TJs hot cocoa for the coffee (I'm not a coffee drinker!) in the recipe. It was exciting using my candy thermometer for this project, and I felt a little fancy bringing the syrup to "soft ball" stage and cooking the eggs as I whipped the frosting. I also broke out my birthday present from some of my girlfriends--a complete cake decorating kit! Despite a few desperate phone calls for instruction, it was virtually snag-free!
These little devils brought out my evil side, because the "angel" frosting was not my favorite party of this treat. I think I'd rather stick to buttercream with some almond extract, and I would go so far as to say these couldn't have been too chocolaty with a chocolate buttercream, either. Don't get me wrong, the devil's food had a deep, rich, and intense chocolate flavor, I just REALLY like Chocolate. The way they were felt a little too...hostess cupcake with twinkie filling for me.

Our neighbors had some last minute guests that stopped by, and since I had 24 cupcakes with very few eaters, we tossed some their way and the cute little girls giggled and oo-ed over the pink pearl toppers. It turned out that we had some spur-of-the-moment special guests, and the sister in attendance had her 12th birthday last weekend so we busted out the candles and made it a special birthday celebration just for her! We served the cupcakes with TJs Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream, which was a perfect compliment to the moist cake.