Maple Chocolate Chip Cupcakes

I don't know about you, but I love this time of year - the sun is shining, the temperature is rising, cupcakes in the oven, and spring is on its way. In my family this means one thing - syrup season. As I have cousins who have a sugar bush, I've grown up knowing that this time of year means fresh,  pure maple syrup. In honour of this marvelous time of year, I decided to make maple cupcakes.

I'd never made (or even tried) maple cupcakes before this experience, so I wasn't sure what to expect. Don't get me wrong, I do love maple syrup but thus far I'd only had it with pancakes, waffles and so on, but never in cake. I found a recipe in The Cupcake Diaries, however, and it seemed fitting for a first attempt. The recipe was for maple chocolate chip cupcakes, which you can find here. It also suggested a chocolate ganache frosting, however I didn't have any heavy cream and opted for the maple cream cheese icing instead.

I knew while they were baking that the cupcakes were going to be good, as there was an incredible scent filling the kitchen as they were nearing the end of their baking time (which I found to be a little longer than the recipe indicated - about 21 minutes rather than 18-20). Wanting to get the full experience of the cupcakes, I tried on before they were iced just to experience the cake on its own. The maple syrup ensured that the cupcakes stayed extremely moist while baking, and provided a delicious flavour.

Next was the icing. It was a basic cream cheese recipe (which you can find here) but had an added 1/4 cup of maple syrup. While it was a nice icing, it was extremely sweet. And when I say extremely, I mean it. It was basically a sugar coma in the making, but tasty nonetheless. And cake is cake, so who am I to complain? I do think I'll make sure to have heavy cream on hand next time though to try them with the ganache frosting instead.