Chocolate orange cupcakes – Da Capo cupcakes

It was a really hot day yesterday, yet in the afternoon I started baking and heating the small flat even more. I can't complain though, as the end result was really nice. I tried my own experimental recipe for chocolate orange cupcakes, and it worked!

The combination of chocolate and orange is just heavenly, don't you think! I've been planning this kind of cupcakes for a long time and now I got my Finnish Da Capo chocolates that are perfect for these cupcakes, so I finally decided to make them (Da capo is a musical term in Italian, meaning from the beginning, literally from the head, which makes me think that I could make these cupcakes again...). Da Capos are iconic Finnish sweets manufactured by Fazer since 1916, and already as a child I adored them. They contain a tiny amount of rum, so I decided to add an additional kick through the Sailor Jerry rum. If you can't get Da Capo chocolates, don't worry, you can replace them with any dark chocolate or orange flavoured chocolate. 

This recipe shall give you about 15 cupcakes.

Cupcake dough:

50 g Da Capo chocolates

1 large orange (zest + 75 ml orange juice)

2 eggs

100 g margarine

85 g sugar

150 ml milk

25 ml Sailor Jerry rum

300 g wheat flour

2 tbsp cocoa powder

3 tsp baking powder

Icing:

50 g Da Capo chocolates

10 g dark baking chocolate

1 tbsp orange zest

2 tbsp bronze crunch (optional, also other sugary decorations can be used)

Preparation:

Pre-heat the oven to 180-200C. Place muffin cases into a muffin tin or use silicone muffin cases.

Start preparing the cupcake dough. Coarsely chop the Da Capo chocolates into chips, grate the orange zest and squeeze the orange juice. One large orange should give enough juice for the dough.

First whisk the eggs, soft margarine, sugar, milk, orange juice and rum into a smooth mixture. Then add the flour, baking powder, cocoa powder and orange zest to the mix, and whisk these until you have an even dough. Finally fold in the chocolate chips with a spatula.

Pour the dough into muffin cases, fill them up halfway. Bake them for about 25-30 minutes until the cakes are baked throughout. Let them cool down after the baking.

Then prepare the icing by melting 2/3 of the remaining Da Capo chocolates in a water bath with an addition of a little baking chocolate as that should make the whole thing a bit smoother. You can also add a dash of milk or rum, if the chocolate needs smoothening. Either save little orange zest from the dough making or grate some more and mix it to the chocolate. Then coarsely chop the rest of the chocolates into chips.

Spread the melted chocolate on top of the cupcakes while it's still warm. Let it cool down for a couple of minutes and then sprinkle the chocolate chips and possibly some bronze crunch on.

Enjoy with friends and coffee!

Your VegHog