Caramel Apple Spice Cupcakes

I love the holidays.  More specifically I love December and Christmas and cold weather.  But, I also love October because it usually brings cooler temperatures, pumpkin patches, Autumn decorations, Starbucks specialty drinks (Pumpkin Spice and Gingerbread Latte, anyone?), "Fall Back" time change, and most importantly, it's only 2 months away from December.  

I also love Fall baking and I've been waiting all year to be able to whip out the cans of pumpkin.  Something just doesn't seem right about using pumpkin during the spring and summer.  Oddly enough though, this recipe has nothing to do with canned pumpkin.  But it is along the same line of thought....Fall.  

Browsing some blogs, I saw a recipe for Caramel Apple Spice Cupcakes at YourCupOfCake.  They looked delicious and I loved the idea of pie filling in a cupcake.  I just "spiced"  it up a little by changing the flavor of the cake mix and chopped the pie filling up more.....and made the icing a little different.


Result:  Icing=I could eat it with only spoon and no cake good.  Cake= more like a muffin, a little dense, but tasty.

The cake batter was pretty thick, but I was okay with that since I've glorified mixes before and the cake still turned out moist and wonderful.  I just don't think there was quite enough liquid though to make these more cakey.  Next time, I think I would still add the water that the box mix calls for in their directions, but cut the oil.   I would assume using the apple pie filling is similar to using apple sauce as a replacement for oil in recipes...right mom? 


Bring on the holidays. Dense cake and all.  

Caramel Apple Spice Cupcakes 
(printable recipe)


Cake:

1 box Spice Cake mix

1 can apple pie filling

3 eggs

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and place cupcake liners in cupcake tin. Place apple pie filling into food processor and pulse until filling is "chunky" and there are no more large slices of apple.  Mix together cake mix, eggs, and pie filling until combined. Fill cupcake liners 2/3 full and bake for 14-18 minutes.  Let cool.

Frosting:

1 (8oz) package cream cheese

2 sticks butter (1 cup)

6-8 cups powdered sugar

1/3 cup caramel

Beat cream cheese and butter together until smooth.  Add caramel and mix.  Add in powdered sugar 1 cup at a time until you reach desired consistency.  Frost cool cupcakes.  Drizzle frosted cupcakes with caramel sauce.