Chocolate Covered Cherry Cupcakes

These cupcakes are based on a cake my Mom used to make for my Dad when I was younger. She would make a chocolate cake and frost it with chocolate frosting, make a raised ring around the top of the cake with frosting, and then pour cherry pie filling inside the ring. I think it was her take on the Black Forest cake.

For the cake part of the cupcakes I used Marth Stewart's Devil's Food cupcake recipe since it used the most cocoa out of all of the chocolate cake recipes I found. I was worried that the cake wouldn't be "chocolatey" enough if I didn't use enough cocoa, and I didn't want to just use a mix for these cakes since I was making them for my Dad's birthday. It turns out that this is plenty of cocoa :)

I made these cupcakes by carving a cone shaped hole in the center of the cupcake after they were cooled and spooning in a little cherry pie filling (about 2-3 cherries). Then I used a pastry bag and large star shaped decorator tip (the one included with the Wilton cupcake decorator kit) to make little stars of chocolate frosting around the pie filling.

Here's the recipe for the cupcakes:
Ingredients

3/4 cup unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder 

3/4 cup hot water

3 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 1/4 teaspoons coarse salt

1 1/2 cups (3 sticks) unsalted butter

2 1/4 cups sugar

4 large eggs, room temperature

1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1 cup sour cream, room temperature

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line standard muffin tins with paper liners. Whisk together cocoa and hot water until smooth. In another bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt.
Melt butter with sugar in a saucepan over medium-low heat, stirring to combine. Remove from heat, and pour into a mixing bowl. With an electric mixer on medium-low speed, beat until mixture is cooled, 4 to 5 minutes. Add eggs, one at a time, beating until each is incorporated, scraping down sides of bowl as needed. Add vanilla, then cocoa mixture, and beat until combined. Reduce speed to low. Add flour mixture in two batches, alternating with the sour cream, and beating until just combined after each.
Divide batter evenly among lined cups, filling each three-quarters full. Bake, rotating tins halfway through, until a cake tester inserted in centers comes out clean, about 20 minutes. Transfer tins to wire racks to cool 15 minutes; turn out cupcakes onto racks and let cool completely. Cupcakes can be stored overnight at room temperature, or frozen up to 2 months, in airtight containers. Makes 32 cupcakes.

I used a calorie calculator from caloriecount.about.com/cc/recipe_analysis.php to calculate the calories of just the cake part. This doesn't include any pie filling or frosting.