Death by Chocolate

Tonight is the eve of the last day of summer school; a day for celebrating! I'll have a full month off to to rejuvenate, travel, and to shorten my list of things to do. Our theme for teacher treats tomorrow is "chocolate," and we'll need plenty of it to survive the last day. I decided to take it to the extreme by making devil's food cupcakes with a chocolate ganache glaze topped with chocolate shavings. I'm taking my cupcake making to a new level by making "from scratch" cupcakes and glaze. Yep, no boxed mix for me this time. I received two cupcake baking books for Christmas-one from my sister and one from my fiance. My sister gave me a bonus gift with the book by mixing up the dry ingredients for a few of the cupcakes. She sealed the mixes in Ziploc bags and labeled each bag with the page number for the recipe. What a great gift idea! This made the baking and the clean up much quicker. I got the recipes for the batter and glaze from these two books, and after a taste test, rave reviews were given. (Not just by me-from a friend who was over and the future huz too). In fact, the cupcakes had a brownie-like taste to them. They reminded me of one of my favorite Columbia desserts at Flat Branch, the "stout brownie." With the success of these cupcakes, I have certainly outdone Duncan Hines.