Chocolate Covered Strawberry Cupcakes

Here's another continuation of my strawberry obsession (especially when chocolate is involved). We had our 3rd anniversary a few days ago and what a great reason to make these. The chocolate cake is a doctored up box mix which makes things a lot easier and the result is the moistest cupcake i've probably ever had. The frosting is a fresh strawberry buttercream and it's pretty amazing.
Normally when I make chocolate covered strawberries I just lay them on parchment paper after I dip them, but this time I didn't want a flat side. I didn't have any styrofoam so I had to get creative. I ended up using an apple placed in a plastic cup to poke the berries into to hold up. There wasn't a lot of room on the apples to hold a lot of berries, but they dried fast enough that I didn't need a whole lot of room. It was a little difficult making sure the apple didn't tip over..but it ended up working fine and I didn't get the flat side! Now i'm just wishing I didn't toss my 40% off at Michaels because I need to go get some styrofoam for an upcoming project.

Chocolate Covered Strawberry Cupcakes
My Baking Addition

Ingredients:

1 (18.25 ounce) package devil’s food cake mix

1 (5.9 ounce) package instant chocolate pudding mix

1 cup sour cream

1 cup vegetable oil

4 eggs, lightly beaten

2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

1/2 cup warm water

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line muffin tin with paper liners or spray with non-stick cooking spray.

2. In the bowl of a stand mixer, fitted with the paddle attachment, or with a hand mixer in a large bowl, beat together the cake and pudding mixes, sour cream, oil, eggs, vanilla and water. Beat for about two minutes on medium speed until well combined.

3. Using a large cookie scoop, distribute the batter between 24 muffin wells; about 3 tablespoons of batter per well.

4. Bake in preheated oven for 18-22 minutes or until a toothpick entered into the center of a cupcake comes out clean. Allow cupcakes to cool inside muffin tins for about 10 minutes.

5. Remove cupcakes from muffin tins and allow to fully cool on a wire rack. Once cupcakes are cool, prepare your frosting.

For the buttercream frosting:
Ingredients:

3 sticks unsalted butter, softened

pinch of fine grain sea salt

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

2 pounds confectioners’ sugar, sifted

6 ounces strawberries, pureed

4-6 tablespoons heavy cream

Directions:

1. Cream butter on medium speed until fluffy. Turn your mixer down to low speed and slowly add in the confectioner’s sugar, and continue mixing until well blended.

2. Add salt, vanilla, 3 tablespoons of heavy cream and strawberry puree. Blend on low speed until moistened. Add an additional 1 to 3 tablespoons of heavy cream until you reach the desired consistency. Beat at high speed until frosting is smooth and fluffy

3. Pipe frosting onto cooled cupcakes and finish with a chocolate covered strawberry.