cupcakes

I made my first sale! Thank-you Cindy. I do wonder why someone in Washington state wants a Texas flag. I'm sure she has a good reason.
A friend was trying to come up with 'spooky treats' for Halloween; my suggestion was to serve 'Devil's Food Cake Cupcakes' isn't that spooky enough? So she asked me to make a couple dozen. These are so good we're always happy to have an excuse to make them. Maybe I can say that the blob of white is a spider egg sack and stick a plastic spider ring in them.

BLACK-BOTTOM CUPCAKES
(or spider sack cupcakes)
Cook’s Country April/May 2007 pg. 27
MAKES 24
Do not substitute regular chocolate chips for the miniature chips. Regular chips are much heavier and will sink to the bottom of the cupcakes.
16 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature
1 ¾ cups sugar
¾ teaspoon salt
2 large egg whites, at room temperature
2 tablespoons plus ¾ cup sour cream, at room temperature
1/3 cup miniature semisweet chocolate chips
1½ cups all-purpose flour
½ cup Dutch-processed cocoa powder
1¼ teaspoons baking soda
1 1/3 cups water
8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted and slightly cooled
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1. Adjust oven rack to lower-middle position and heat oven to 400 degrees. Line 2 standard muffin tins with cupcake liners.
2. With electric mixer on medium speed, beat cream cheese, ½ cup sugar, and ¼ teaspoon salt in medium bowl until smooth, about 30 seconds. Beat in egg whites and 2 tablespoons sour cream until combined, about 1 minute. Stir in chocolate chips and set aside.
3. Whisk remaining sugar, remaining salt, flour, cocoa. and baking soda in large bowl. Make well in center, add remaining sour cream, water, butter, and vanilla and whisk until just combined. Divide batter evenly among 24 cupcake liners and top each batter with 1 rounded tablespoon cream cheese mixture. Bake until tops of cupcakes just begin to crack, 23 to 25 minutes. Cool cupcakes in tins for 10 minutes before transferring to wire rack to cool completely. (Cupcakes can be refrigerated in airtight container for up to 2 days)