Cupcake Challenge #9- Tiramisu cupcakes

Tiramisu cupcakes: vanilla sponge cake soaked in coffee syrup, topped with mascarpone frosting, sprinkled with cocoa powder. Deee-lish! I have made tiramisu cupcakes before, but I just used my regular vanilla cupcakes and topped them with mascarpone frosting. These are a little more involved. First of all, the cake itself is a sponge cake, very very light and airy. And this recipe called for infusing a vanilla bean in warm milk before adding it to the batter, which leaves little specks of vanilla in the baked cupcakes.

Here they are right out of the oven:

Then, I made a coffee syrup. The recipe called for adding marsala wine too, but I omitted that, mostly because I'd have to buy a whole bottle for only 1/4 cup worth. If I were making more than one batch of these, I'd do it, but not for just one use. The cupcakes were brushed with the coffee syrup multiple times. The recipe says to use 1/3 cup coffee and let it absorb into the cupcakes. I used maybe half of that, and they were soaked through.

Here are the cupcakes after brushing them with the coffee syrup:

They look a little messy and soggy, but they smelled wonderful! The mascarpone frosting was next, which was simply whipped cream folded into the cheese with a little bit of sugar. I also added a drop of vanilla, because it makes all frostings taste better :) I dolloped the frosting on top of the soaked cupcakes.

Here they are, so fluffy and mouth-watering!

The final step was to sprinkle cocoa powder on top, just like real tiramisu. These must be eaten the same day, because the coffee syrup makes the cupcakes too soggy to keep overnight. I like that the cake and frosting are both light and airy, it makes you feel not as bad when eating them! Although this recipe was a lotmore work than my own, I think it's better, and would definitely use it in the future.
Next up: Banana-Pecan cupcakes with Caramel Buttercream. Tasty!