Cookies and Cream Cupcakes

For the cupcakes:
1. Preheat your oven to 375˚F. Place muffin liners in the cups of two 12-count muffin trays and stick an Oreo in each cup, set aside.
2. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together butter and sugar until light and fluffy, 5 to 6 minutes.
3. Add eggs, one at a time, and beat until creamy, occasionally scraping down sides of the bowl using a spatula.
4. In a large bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, and salt.
5. In a small bowl, mix together half-and-half, vanilla and vanilla seeds.
6. With mixer on low speed, add flour mixture into the creamed sugar mixture, alternating with the vanilla mixture, beginning and ending with flour. Beat until just combined.
7. Divide batter into the muffin cups so that each cup is about 3/4 of the way full.
8. Bake until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Remove from oven and allow cupcakes to cool in the pan for about 15 minutes. Then remove them from the pan and cool the rest of the way on a wire rack.

For the marshmallow filling:
In the clean bowl of your electric mixer beat together the marshmallow creme, butter, vanilla and heavy cream until smooth. Then gradually add the powdered sugar until it’s all in. Then increase the speed of the mixer and beat for one minute. Pop into the fridge until you need it.

For the Oreo buttercream:
1. In the clean bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the soft butter for 7 minutes on high. Time it. This is what gives it that ice cream flavor so don’t cut it short.
2. Once the butter is all creamy and beaten slow the mixer down to low and add in the powdered sugar. Beat until smooth and creamy again.
3. Add the cream gradually, a couple tablespoons at a time while keeping the mixer on low. Keep adding until the frosting is a pipe-able consistency. Then mix in the vanilla.
4. OK, so here is where I kinda messed up as far visually. I made the frosting while the cupcakes where cooling and it was going to be a while before I actually piped them. I went ahead and added the cookies into the frosting and I shouldn’t have. They still looked OK and tasted great but by the time I actually used the frosting I needed to beat it a little more to loosen it up and then the cookies had softened and then I beat it and the frosting kind of turned black as you can see in the photo. So … When you are ready to use the frosting fold the cookie crumbs into the frosting until fully incorporated. Then you will have frosting that looks exactly like cookies and cream ice cream and pretty much tastes the same—just not as cold. YUM!

For the assembly:
1. First find yourself a small round cookie cutter if you have one. If not you could probably just cut out a circle with a sharp knife. Use the cutter and cut down into the top of the cupcake (don’t go all the way through) and then twist until the cutout comes loose and you can remove it. Do this with all the cupcakes. Set the cutout next to each cupcake because you’ll use it in a second.
2. Then fill the hole on each cupcake with about a tablespoon of the marshmallow filling and place the cutout cupcake piece on the top. Repeat with remaining cupcakes.
3. Then fill your piping bag with the buttercream and pipe a swirl around the top of each cupcake, hiding the filling and cutout on top of it.

Serve and enjoy!

Buttercream recipe adapted from Sweetapolita. Marshmallow Filling and concept from tasteandtellblog.com, cake recipe adapted from marthastewart.com