AKA: Coconut Caramel Filled Banana Cupcakes + Toasted Coconut Topped Cream Cheese Buttercream.
Ingredients
Cupcakes:
9 Tablespoons Unsalted Butter, at room temperature
1 cup Sugar
3 Eggs
4 Bananas
1/3 cup Sour Cream
1 1/4 cups Flour
3/4 teaspoon Baking Soda
1 1/2 teaspoons Baking Powder
3/4 teaspoon Kosher Sea Salt
Coconut Caramel:
2/3 cup Sugar
1/2 cup Heavy Cream
4 Tablespoons Virgin Coconut Oil
1 teaspoon Kosher Sea Salt
1 cup shredded Coconut, toasted
Cream Cheese Buttercream:
3/4 pound or 1 1/2 cups Cream Cheese
7 Tablespoons Unsalted Butter
3/4 cup Powdered Sugar
Optional Garnish
1 cup shredded Coconut, toasted
Prepare
Preheat the oven to 350.
FOR THE CUPCAKES:
In a small bowl, puree together bananas and sour cream with an immersion blender or other tool. Set aside for later.
In another bowl, whisk together dry ingredients: flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt.
In the bowl of a stand mixer, or in a bowl with an hand mixer, beat together butter and sugar until light and fluffy. About 3-5 minutes.
Add eggs one at a time into the butter mixture. Beating with each addition until fully incorporated. Beat until light and fluffy.
Alternate adding in flour and banana mixture into butter mixture until fully incorporated into a smooth batter.
Line with cupcake papers (or grease and flour) 3x 6 cupcake tins (or 1 + 1/2 a 12 cup cupcake tin), and fill 3/4 with batter. Makes 18 standard cupcakes.
Bake at 350 degrees for about 20-24 minutes.
Remove muffins from tin and cool on a cooling rack.
FOR THE COCONUT CARAMEL:
Spoon a thin, even layer of sugar into a small heavy saucepan. I use a little copper saucepan to best regulate heat.
Cook over medium heat leaving sugar undisturbed (NO stirring) until mostly melted. This will take about about 2-4 minutes, depending on the size of sugar grain.
Spoon another layer of sugar over the melted sugar, swirling pan to incorporate the granular sugar into the melted sugar.
Continue to spoon over layers of sugar until all the sugar has been incorporated.
Continue to cook the sugar, swirling the saucepan until the caramel is a dark amber. This will happen quickly, so watch closely. You can stop sooner if you prefer a lighter caramel flavor.
Remove pan from the heat. Slowly and carefully start pouring in the cream in batches. Stirring with each addition to combine before the next addition.
The caramel will foam, sputter and seize up. Don’t worry about this, just be careful as it is molten sugar.
Return saucepan to the stove and cook over low heat.
Stirring mixture until the hard seized bits of caramel have dissolved.
Stir in the coconut oil until mixture is smooth.
If the oil separates, turn up the heat, and stir more vigorously until smooth.
Remove caramel from heat and stir in toasted coconut.
Allow to cool to room temperature, then cover with plastic and chill for storage.
The caramel can be made 4 days in advance.
FOR THE CREAMCHEESE BUTTERCREAM:
Have all ingredients at room temperature. If it is a cold day you may need to soften butter and cream chees in the microwave (10 second intervals until soft but not melted). Another way I make sure that the ingredients are soft is to place them near the stovetop if I am baking.
Beat butter until light and fluffy.
Add in cream cheese an ounce at a time, waiting for it to be light and fluffy before the next addition.
Beat in powdered sugar a little bit at a time until frosting reaches the desired consistency.
TO ASSEMBLE:
Cut a cavity into each cupcake, reserving a piece of cake to close cavity once filled.
Fill cavity with coconut caramel.
Top cavity with cake.
Frost with cream cheese buttercream.
Top with toasted coconut shavings.
Makes 18 cupcakes.
