French Toast Cupcakes With Browned Butter Frosting

If I'm not mistaken, we've finally reached the end of the posts about my holiday baking. I'll admit that I went a little overboard, as I seem to do every year, but I get so excited to have a captive audience when my family visits that I want to spoil them. Now excuse me while I go into a sugar coma and, once recovered from that, spend the rest of my life working off these calories.

When my Spekulatius cupcake recipe made a paltry nine cupcakes I knew I had to scramble and come up with more cupcakes for my family. While a ratio of four people to nine cupcakes might seem fine to you, rest assured that in my family such a dire situation could result in bloodshed. I handed my little brother my trusty copy of 125 Best Cupcake Recipes and told him to pick one. My kitchen's pretty well stocked so when he landed on the French toast cupcakes I knew I already had everything on hand to whip up a batch.

I'd made these before and have always gotten positive reviews, so if you're looking for another universally popular flavor here's a good choice. The maple and cinnamon flavors shine through nicely. Topped with my new favorite, browned butter frosting, these were a hit with my family. My mom nicely decorated them for me using some festive sprinkles. She's enough like me that she went for the minimalist look with a few red balls and one tiny Christmas tree on each. So nice to have some help in the kitchen!

French Toast Cupcakes
Recipe from 125 Best Cupcake Recipes by Julie Hasson

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp. salt
1 c. sugar
1/2 c. (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted then cooled
2 eggs
1 tsp. maple extract
1/2 c. whole milk

1) Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Line muffin tin with 12 baking liners.
2) Combine flour, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt in a mixing bowl.
3) In a large bowl, whisk together butter, sugar, and eggs until combined; add maple extract.
4) Alternate between whisking in flour mixture and milk into your liquid mixture. Make 3 additions of flour and 2 of milk. Beat until smooth.
5) Pour batter into prepared pan and bake 20-25 minutes until golden brown and tops spring back when lightly touched. Cool cupcakes for 10 minutes, remove from pan and allow to cool completely before frosting.

Browned Butter Frosting
Recipe adapted from The Sister's Cafe

1/3 cup unsalted butter
3 cups powdered sugar
1 1/2 tsp vanilla
2+ Tb heavy cream

1) Melt butter in small saucepan over medium heat. Continue cooking, stirring constantly and watching closely, until butter just starts to turn golden (4 to 6 minutes). Butter will get foamy and bubble and you will see black flecks start to form toward the end. Remove from heat. Cool to room temperature.
2) Beat butter and powdered sugar with an electric mixer until combined. Add vanilla and gradually add cream until frosting reaches the desired consistency. Pipe onto cooled cupcakes.