Cupcake Test Take Three

Making cupcakes (again) was not in my plans for today.  Making chocolate stout caramels was.  However.  I had made a couple of alterations to my first cupcake recipe and apparently not for the better.  While the first ones were lacking somewhat in flavor, the second batch's downfall was texture.  Dry cupcakes will win no prizes.  I made a syrup to brush them with, and while making syrup is not at all difficult it just adds another step and I don't want the recipe to appear overly complicated.  But on a more positive note, my experimental buttercream worked perfectly.

Good buttercream on bad cupcakes.

So today, instead of chocolate stout caramels, I'm giving the cupcakes one more shot.  If they don't work today, I'm calling it quits.  While not one to give up easily and I usually chalk up my failures to learning experiences, I'm already close to crossing the line between tenacity and blind obsessiveness and I don't want to get too far on the other side. 

Plus, I'm almost out of butter.