Hot Fudge Sundae Cupcakes

For Father's Day I made my dad a delicious Carrot Cake that I owed him.  But, since I don't like vegetables with my dessert, I had to make something else, cause I'm not going without dessert.  I saw a recipe for Hot Fudge Sundae Cupcakes and thought they looked adorable, so I decided to give them a try.  I simplified the recipe and they ended up being not only adorable, but delicious too.  I was really surprised at how much they actually tasted like a hot fudge sundae.  And they really are quite easy to make.

Adapted from: Joy the Baker

Here's what I used for the cupcakes:
1 White cake mix and the ingredients needed to make the cake according to the box
3 Tbsp Vanilla Extract

Here's what I did to make the cupcakes:
I prepared the cake mix according to the directions. I also added 3 Tbsp of Vanilla Extract.  I baked the cupcakes according to the box, removing them from the oven when they were golden brown.  I put them on a cooling rack upside down until they were cool.



Here's what I used for the chocolate ganache:
2 1/4 Cups Miniature Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips (a little more than a 12 oz bag)
3/4 Cup Heavy Whipping Cream

Here's what I did to make the chocolate ganache:
I poured the chocolate chips into a bowl.  I put the cream in a pan and simmered it on the stove until it was very warm (but I did not let it boil).  Once the cream was warm, I poured it over the chocolate chips.  I let that sit for about a minute.  Then I stirred the mixture together, letting the cream melt the chocolate, until the mixture was completely smooth. 

     Hint:  If you didn't get the cream warm enough to melt the chocolate chips all the
      way, just put the bowl in the microwave and heat it up for 10 seconds at a time. 
      Stir after you heat it up each time to see if the chocolate chips are melted -- you
      only want to heat it enough to melt the chocolate chips.



Here's what I used to assemble the cupcakes:
Caramel
Whipped Cream
Maraschino Cherries
Chocolate Sprinkles

Here's what I did to assemble the cupcakes:
I wanted to try stuffing the cupcakes, so the first thing I did was use an apple corer to remove the center of each cupcake (Bonus!  I get to eat all the centers!).  Then I filled about half of the center of each cupcake up with whipped cream.  I filled the other half of the center up with caramel.  (The caramel was a last minute idea.  I was at my mom's house and she happened to have those little cups of caramel for dipping apples in, so I used those.  I just heated each one up a bit in the microwave to make the caramel easy to work with.)

Then I iced the cupcakes with the ganache.  I made sure to put a little extra ganache over the center of each cupcake so that the ganache would seep into the center of each cupcake as well.

After I let the ganache cool until it was firm, I put whipped cream, a cherry, and chocolate sprinkles on each cupcake.  

Enjoy!