Nutella Filled Cupcakes with Banana Frosting

I made these a while ago. They were my first attempt at making cupcakes from scratch. Since I like putting nutella on bananas when I eat them raw, I decided banana and nutella cupcakes would be yummy. I started out with a vanilla cake batter to keep it simple, filled the cakes with nutella, and made a banana frosting and caramelized bananas to put on the top.

I got the recipes from various sites (I don't remember where, so here they are reproduced).

Cupcake
Ingredients:

• 2 1/4 cups flour
• 1 1/3 cups sugar
• 3 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 cup shortening
• 1 cup milk
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 2 large eggs
• Nutella (at least 1 cup)

Preheat oven to 350 °F. Line cupcake pans with paper liners. Combine flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt in a large mixing bowl. Add shortening, milk, and vanilla. Beat for 1 minute on medium speed (scrape the side of the bowl with a spatula). Add eggs and beat for 1 minute on medium speed. Scrape the bowl. Beat on high for 1 and a half minutes until well mixed. Spoon cupcake batter into paper liners until 1/2 to 2/3 full. Bake 20-25 minutes (or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean). Cool 5 minutes in pans, remove, and place and wire racks.

To fill with Nutella:
Cut a scoop out of each cupcake center. Microwave the Nutella for about ten seconds (to make it easily scoopable). Fill the holes in the cupcakes with Nutella using a spoon. Put the top part of the cupcake centers back onto the cake (you get to eat the crumbs of the cake that get replaced by Nutella!).

Banana Icing
Ingredients:

• 1/4 cup butter, softened
• 1/2 cup mashed bananas
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 3 1/4 cup confectioner's (powdered) sugar

Cream together banana, butter, and vanilla. Slowly beat in the sugar, adding more if needed, to make a fluffy, spreadable icing (My icing didn't turn out too well. I think you're supposed to add the banana and vanilla after the icing gets the right texture, because I couldn't get it to come out well).

Frost the cupcakes when they are completely cooled. I used a Ziploc bag with a hole cut in the corner to pipe the frosting onto the cakes.

Caramelized Bananas
Ingredients:

• 1 banana
• Some white sugar (to coat)

Slice the banana. Roll the banana pieces in the sugar until completely coated. Heat a nonstick pan to medium high. Add the sugar coated bananas. Cook 4-5 minutes (light to golden brown underneath). Flip the bananas without letting them burn. Turn the heat to medium and brown the bananas (~1 min). Transfer the bananas to a plate (sprayed with nonstick spray so they don't get stuck).

My attempt at caramelized bananas wasn't very good. A lot of them broke or got burnt. I think you shouldn't slice them too thin, and you have to eat them pretty soon, or they'll get soft.

Place one slice of caramelized banana on top of each cupcake. Makes 24 cupcakes (and extra icing, depending on how much you use).

The process of filling the cupcakes.

Cross-sectional cut of the completed cupcake.