Chocolate Surprise Cupcakes

This may be a Pillsbury recipe, but I am taking credit for the cute cupcake liners and decorations. I did not fully follow the recipe, I used a vanilla frosting and chocolate chips on top as opposed to making mini chocolate chip cookies.

Find the original pillsbury recipe here, but i will also provide the recipe and directions below.

You will need these ingredients to make the chocolate cupcake:
1 1/2 cups of gluten free flour (I use King Arthur's flour for everything)
1/2 cup og cocoa powder (I use Hershey's Unsweetened Cocoa)
1 1/4 teaspoons of baking soda
1/2 teaspoon xanthan gum
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups sugar (I only used 1 1/4 cups and the cupcakes were way too sweet)
1/2 canola oil
1 cup warm water

You will also need the container of gluten free cookie dough. I used most of the container to make the cupcakes but ate a few small bites.


So the point of this recipe was to use the new gluten free refridgerated cookie dough from Pillsbury. Let me just tell you I was eating the cookie dough that was left over with a spoon. 

This is the making 3/4 inch cookie dough balls for the inside of the cupcakes. My balls were a little big because I eyeballed it, but it still worked. I would be more careful next time.



This is what the cupcakes looked like when I put them in the oven. The balls were sticking out but the cupcake baked up and around it, leaving a flat surface in the end, perfect for decorating. The chocolate cake was super moist and so was the cookie. Many of my co-workers who I bake for, don't realize anything is gluten free until I take a bite. They were also really surprised by the addition when they bit into the cupcake.

I used a canned vanilla frosting from Cherrybrook Farms to frost these cupcakes. I'm not sure if the can had been around a while, but it seemed like more of a glaze and was super sweet. It is not a product I would buy again.

To make these cupcakes:

-preheat the oven to 350 degrees
-place cupcake liners in a cupcake pan
-make cookie dough balls- approximately 3/4 inch in size
-put cake ingredients in an electric mixer and mix on medium speed for 1-2 minutes or until blended- I used the electric mixer because it said to (the first time I tend to follow the recipe), but im sure it would have worked the same with a hand mixer or a fork.
-spoon 2 tablespoons of batter into each cupcake liner, add cookie dough ball into the center, cover balls with another spoon of batter.
-bake for 28-30 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean
-frost with choice of frosting and toppings or follow the recipe for the frosting and mini chocolate chip cookie.


Although the recipe says it makes 12 cupcakes, I got 18 in my batch. It might have been because my cookie dough balls were too big so I used less batter. I had enough cookie dough to put a surprise in all 18 cupcakes. I would make these cupcakes again and recommend them to you for a sweet treat.

Breana