These carrot cake chocolate cupcakes are a step up from carrot cake & great any time of the year. With a chocolate spider web, they are perfect for Halloween.
I discovered Kitchenaid was raising money for Susan G. Komen Foundation through a Cook for the Cure program. All you had to do was bake some cupcakes during the month of October and place a picture of them on Instagram or Twitter with the hashtags #10000cupcakes, #donate and @KitchenAidUSA and they would donate $1 to help find a cure for breast cancer. What an awesome thing to do!
Since I am in the middle of #Choctoberfest I thought, why not just whip up some chocolate cupcakes for the cause. And since I seem to be on a roll of including veggies in my chocolate recipes I chose to make Carrot Cake Chocolate Cupcakes. And they came out delicious!
It is a little different than most of the recipes I found on the internet since I subbed in some applesauce, unsweetened of course, for some of the oil, but no one would notice the difference. I also added some special chocolate spider webs as a decoration that would make them great to serve as a Halloween party treat.
Two of our sponsors for Choctoberfest, Imperial Sugar and Divine Chocolate, happily provided me with plenty of sugar and delicious chocolate to create this recipe. Their products are awesome, honestly, so give their websites a look-see if you get the chance.
Try my Carrot Sheet Cake with buttermilk glaze to make it extra moist and cream cheese frosting.
Find lots of great dessert recipes here on 2CM!
Mini Chocolate Carrot Cake Cupcakes
Ingredients
Cupcakes
- 1 ½ cups carrots, grated
- ⅓ cup unsweetened applesauce
- ½ cup vegetable oil
- 2 eggs
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 cup flour
- 1 cup sugar
- ⅓ cup cocoa powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ¼ teaspoon nutmeg
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
Cream Cheese Frosting
- 1 cup butter, room temperature
- 8 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
- 4 cups powdered sugar
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- Garnish: colorful sprinkles
Instructions
Cupcakes
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a mini muffin tin with cupcake liners.
- In a large bowl, combine grated carrots, applesauce, oil, eggs, and vanilla.
- In a medium bowl, combine flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda, salt, nutmeg, and cinnamon.
- Stir dry ingredients into wet ingredients.
- Using a tablespoon, fill each muffin cup about ⅔ full.
- Bake for 11-15 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
- Let cool for 10 minutes in the muffin tin on a wire rack then remove cupcakes to a wire rack to cool completely.
Frosting
- In an electric mixer, cream the butter and cream cheese. Add vanilla extract. Turn the mixer to low speed and add the powdered sugar a little at a time. Once mixed in, turn up the speed and mix until creamy.
- When the cupcakes are cool, pipe frosting on top using a star tip. Decorate with colorful sprinkles.
Nutrition
This post has been updated and was first published on October 11, 2015.