Who Needs Hostess? Part II

Remember last week when I showed you how I made copy-cat Twinkies?  Well, this week, I’ll show you how to make copy-cat Hostess Chocolate Cupcakes…but with more taste, less preservatives, and more awesomeness.  Ready?!

My oldest asked me to replicate the Hostess Cupcakes for his 12th birthday a few weeks ago.  I started off my making Devil’s Food Cupcakes. 

Follow the recipe exactly as shown on the website, except divide your batter between 2 lined muffin pans.  This gave me 24 cupcakes.  Don’t make the frosting in the recipe. 

…unless you want to, then knock yourself out!  I used Chocolate Ganache Frosting to frost my cupcakes.  Mix up your Ganache and let it cool to room temperature.  Don’t frost the cupcakes yet.  You need to fill them first.

I used this delicious, heavenly Perfect Cupcake Frosting and Filling from my best friends at Our Best Bites to fill these cupcakes.  I doubled the recipe.  Reserve about one cup of frosting to pipe the little swirly pattern on top of the cupcake later on.

Now, you can fill these the same way I did the Twinkies:

…or you can use one of these:

…and just inject the filling into the top of the cupcake.  Whichever you prefer.

Once the cupcakes are filled, spoon the room temperature Ganache over the top of the cupcakes.  You’ll probably want to do this 2-3 times for a thicker layer of frosting.

Once the Ganache has set up, pipe your little swirly design on the cupcakes with your frosting tips.  A Ziploc bag with the corner snipped off works, too.

You don’t have to do the swirly pattern.  On my second pan, my boys and I piped baseballs, basketballs, footballs, smiley faces, etc…  It was a lot of fun.

Drool…I totally want some now.

Of course, if you don’t want to go to all this work (I promise, you’ll miss out on an incredible taste experience…) you could always pick up a box of these:

So, really?  Who needs Hostess?!  ;)

Not me!