Banana Cupcakes with Chocolate and Peanut Butter Frosting.

Update your google readers! http://feeds.feedburner.com/howsweeteats/smSp

Have you checked out my fitness section yet? Workouts, thoughts, recipes and eats will be accumulating there.

We buy bundles of bananas every week. I like them very ripe. My husband eats them green.

How gross is that? Are there any other green-banana-eaters out there?

This poses a dilemma, as green bananas only stay green for about what? A day?

We are always left with bananas, which forces me to make banana treats.

Then I’m forced to eat the banana treats.

You know what I mean. They sit on the counter and taunt me.

A few months ago for my parent’s anniversary, I made a banana cake with cream cheese icing. My dad and brother said it was so sweet that it hurt their teeth.

That is the best thing anyone could ever say to me – since nothing is too sweet for me and my butter-lovin’ tastebuds.

This cake was made before I began blogging ever wrote anything down, so I was on a mission to recreate it.

All I could remember was that I put brown sugar (the healthy kind, since it’s brown) in the cake.

I added a bunch of other ingredients, hoping it would turn out ‘just ok.’

A few years ago, I usually relied on box mixes. That was pretty much all I knew, and it was simple and quick.

I then moved on to making things from scratch, but using recipes, like Mother Lovett’s.

Now, I think it is fun experimenting with ideas and seeing if I can actually ‘make’ my own cake recipe. It is tricky, and I’ve had many mess-ups, but it is worth it.

These turned out better than I ever could have imagined. I only added a touch of cinnamon, so it the banana flavor was more prominent.

I love bananas in a morning shake, but I also love them with peanut butter. It is a warm and cozy, comforting snack. Have you ever dipped them in chocolate syrup? That is another decadent treat.

When it came time for frosting, I knew boring old cream cheese frosting just wasn’t going to please me. I’m dramatic, easily excited, and sometimes flakey.

I needed something more.

A mix of frostings.

Peanut butter and chocolate cream cheese frosting.

Plain peanut butter cream cheese frosting.

Chocolate cream cheese frosting, which I think tastes like chocolate mousse.

Banana Cupcakes

1 1/4 cups flour

2 teaspoons baking soda

1/4 teaspoon cinnamon

1/4 cup softened butter

1/2 cup sugar

1/4 cup brown sugar

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 ripes bananas, mashed

1/4 cup buttermilk

Preheat oven to 350.

Cream butter and sugars together until fluffy. Add vanilla and eggs, mixing until thoroughly combined. Add mashed banana. In a separate bowl, combine dry ingredients.

Add half of dry ingredients to banana mixture. Stir in buttermilk. Add the remaining dry ingredients. Pour into cupcake pans.

I used mini cupcake pans, and baked for 15 minutes. Makes 24 mini cupcakes.

Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting

1 8-oz block of softened cream cheese

1 cup softened butter

1 lb powdered sugar

3 tablespoons Trader Joe’s Dutch Process Cocoa Powder

1 teaspoon vanilla

Cream ingredients together until thoroughly mixed. If icing seems to thick, add some milk 1 teaspoon at a time. Frost cupcakes or cake.

Peanut Butter Cream Cheese Frosting recipe can be found HERE.

And also, don’t forget to eat lots of cupcakes. Right after you make them. Sharing is overrated.

Tagged as: banana, chocolate, cupcakes, peanut butter, recipes