Instant Smile

These cupcakes are nothing too special or extravagant. What they are is a general crowd pleaser. The childish flavors will promise to bring a smile to your face and all of your guests, and their baking ease will motivate you to make them time after time. If you want to pipe the icing, make sure you make your cookie crumbs very small, or you’ll have to use a knife to ice the frosting. Besides that, that are easy, fun, and of course, delicious!

Recipe:

Cookies and Cream Cake Batter:

1 box Arrowhead Mills vanilla cake mix

1 cup water

3 organic eggs (or Ener-G Egg Replacer)

1/2 cup organic vegetable oil

30 Newman O’s Orignal Flavor (or mix it up–go for a mint cookie batter!)

Cookies and Cream Buttercream:

1 cup Earth Balance Butter, room temperature

3 cups confectioners sugar, sifted and set aside

3-5 tablespoons soy milk

1 teaspoon organic, fair-trade vanilla extract

Preheat your oven 350F. Line 24 cupcake tins with paper lines, set the pans aside. Using 12 of the cookies, place one side of the cookies on the bottom of the cupcake liner, making sure icing is on each of the half and placing the icing side facing up. Break up the remaining cookies into crumbs using a rolling pin and a ziploc bag. Set aside.

Place the cake mix, water, oil, and eggs into a bowl with a mixer. Blend for about 2 minutes until mixed throughly. Measure out about 1 and 1/2 of the crumbs and place into the batter. Spoon into the cupcake tins, each should be about 3/4 full.

Bake the cupcakes until they are lightly browned and come out clean using a cake tester, about 18 minutes. Remove the cupcakes from the oven and let cool on a wire rack for about 5 minutes. Place each individual cupcake onto a wire rack and let cool for a least a half hour.

While waiting for them to cool, prepare your cookies and cream buttercream frosting. Blend the butter with an electric mixer for about 30 seconds until it reaches a fluffy consistency. Add the sugar, 3 tablespoons of the milk, and the vanilla. Blend on low speed until all combined. Add more milk if the texture of the frosting is too thick and continue to beat until light and fluffy. Add the remaining cookie crumbs and frost onto your cupcakes. Make sure to keep these cupcakes in a cool room or the refrigerator until serving due to the buttercream frosting.

Play On,

Tracy