Devil’s Food Cupcakes with Vanilla Cream Filling

For the cupcakes:
Heat the oven to 325F. Place cupcake liners in 2 cupcake tins (24 total cupcakes). Put the chocolate and cocoa powder in a medium sized bowl. Pour the hot coffee into the bowl and stir until all of the chocolate has melted and it is combined. Add milk and stir until smooth. Set aside.

In a separate bowl, sift the flour, baking soda and salt together then set aside.

In your mixing bowl, beat butter and both sugars on medium speed for a few minutes until the mixture is light and fluffy. Add in eggs one at a time, scrape down sides of the bowl and beat well after each egg. Add vanilla and beat until combined.

Add the chocolate mixture and the flour mixture in three parts, starting and finishing off with the flour mixture. Mix until well combined, but do not over mix.

Pour cupcake batter into cupcake pans and fill cups 2/3 full. Bake at 325F for 25 minutes or until a cake tester comes out clean. Remove from oven and allow to cool 5 minutes on counter. Then carefully remove cupcakes from tin on to wire racks and allow to cool completely.

For the Cream Filling:
Place a small saucepan over medium heat and cook the milk and flour until thick. Do not let it reach a boil, this will happen very quickly. Stir continuously until mixture has thickened up. Remove from heat and set aside in a bowl and allow to cool to room temperature.

In a separate bowl, cream the butter and granulated sugar together until light and fluffy. Dump in the milk mixture, powdered sugar and vanilla bean seeds (or extract) and beat at a high speed for 5 minutes. If mixture is too thick, add an extra 1/8 a cup of milk.

For the Icing:
Combine the butter, cocoa powder, powdered sugar, milk and vanilla on high speed until icing is light and fluffy.

Assembly:
With a cupcake corer or paring knife, cut a small hole into the top middle of the cupcake. Put the filling into a piping bag if you have one – or you can put it in a Ziploc bag with a corner cut off. Then squeeze the bag to fill the cupcake hole with the vanilla cream filling – make sure to fill it to the top. Top the cupcake with the chocolate icing.