Why haven’t I thought of this before? Pound cake cupcakes!? These. were. AWESOME. I love pound cake, and will eat it in hearty portions probably not appropriate to talk about here. Usually I make some chocolate sauce to eat with it, although not overpower it, so I figured: Pound cake cupcakes, WITH chocolate ganache to give it just a little chocolate topping! Perfect! I’ve actually made these twice in the last week…. shh.

When I made the vanilla extract in November I also used some beans to make some vanilla sugar – something I liked the idea of but had no idea what to use for. See a trend here? Remember those almond flour cookies? I should probably start thinking my ideas out ahead of time. Oh well – this one turned out fantastically! The vanilla sugar gave the cake a delicious flavor, and the red wine ganache gave it a kick to balance everything out.

Usually when I bake a pound cake I start with a cold oven, as I’m convinced it is the best way to get a dense result; however, I preheated the oven for these cupcakes because I figured a compromise between light, fluffy cupcakes and a super dense pound cake would probably be a good start. It was a perfect result of dense and flavorful, yet still light enough to feel like you aren’t eating a brick.

Vanilla Sugar Pound Cupcakes with Red Wine Chocolate Ganache

Adapted from Smitten Kitchen

1 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
4 oz cream cheese, at room temperature
1.5 cups vanilla sugar
3 large eggs
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1.5 cups all purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup heavy cream
8 oz dark chocolate, finely chopped
2 Tbsp red wine

Preheat the oven to 325 F. Prepare a cupcake tin with liners.

Cream butter and cream cheese together in a large bowl until smooth. Add the sugar and beat on high for five minutes, until light and airy. Add the eggs, one at a time, then vanilla, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed. Add the flour and salt together, and beat until just incorporated.

Fill cupcake liners until 3/4 full, and shake gently to smooth the top. Bake until a cake tester comes out clean, about 40 minutes. Let cupcakes cool completely before making the ganache.

For the ganache, heat the cream until almost boiling, then add to chocolate and let sit for 2 minutes before stirring. Stir until completely smooth, then add red wine and stir again. Let cool to your desired consistency, then pour over cupcakes. Let the ganache set before serving cupcakes.

Notes and Tips:

• Apparently Philadelphia brand cream cheese is the best for baking, as it has a lower water content than most other brands. I usually buy what is cheapest… but this is good to know!
• The ganache can be tricky – I just wanted a thin glazed layer, but some of my cupcakes were too tall and therefore the liners didn’t serve their purpose of holding the ganache in place. In that case, I let the ganache cool a bit more and then used it as more of a spread.

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