Banana Cupcakes with Caramel Buttercream

I make or bring treats for everyone of my student's birthdays so I thought that I would let the next birthday boy pick the recipe that I was going to make. This gent looked at the website and he selected these. He was sure pleased with his selection! He told me that he never had cupcakes that were that good.

After I made these cupcakes last week I realized that Martha has renamed this recipe for her website and that Mindy and I have made the same cupcakes!

http://www.marthastewart.com/recipe/banana-cupcakes-with-caramel-buttercream

I did not use nuts or white flour. I did make them with a 2/3 brown rice and 1/3 corn flour and the cake turned out amazing!

Ok, I don't think Mindy had any problems making her cupcakes but I sure did! I know I am the weakest link when it comes to our little threesome and that baking is not my strong point - I make amazing spaghetti sauce from scratch that will know your socks off! but I am really trying.

These took me 40 minutes to make and cook the muffin part; however, the icing took me 2 hours because IT IS REALLY HARD! My bananas were not very ripe but they worked just fine and the muffins were amazing not dry at all and they lasted really well.

The icing was another story all together! I tried to do too much and I failed twice in two different places! I looked at the recipe and it looked like I was going to have to cook up the caramel and the egg whites I thought that I would just do it at he same time but instead they both started to boil! My eggs white cooked and I knocked the double boiler over when I was trying to get it off the stove and THEN! my caramel crystallized in my pan and I had a large rock of stuck sugar glued to my pot. I had to chuck out the egg whites and re-start the double boiler where Angel my daughter came and stirred the whites for me while I tried to mend the caramel.

I did not give her very good instructions regarding what she needed to do other than stir the pot with a whisk. I put some more water in the pot of rock hard sugar which re-liquefied once it was no longer dried out it came back to life and I thought I had a hope. Angel did not know what she was doing and kept asking me questions (which is good on one hand) but she distracted me from the caramel - which was not really boiling - then whilst I was helping with the egg whites my caramel dried right up and turned into CRAP! So while Angel started to beat the whites I put more water into the pot and kind of over did it with the water and then I had to wait for EVER for the water to dissolve and the caramel to form - but when I did OMG! what a fantastic tasty treat! All by itself it was terrific! The rest of the instructions were very straight forward and the icing is amazing.

My hubby was eating the muffins by simply breaking them apart and dipping them into the frosting lol!

I would certainly make these cupcakes again - now that I know to just take my time. and I would make the muffing part just as muffins because they are just so terrific!