You wouldn’t be a kiwi growing up in New Zealand if there wasn’t the smell of freshly baked Afghans as a child, or even as an adult. There’s something super nostalgic and delicious about these chocolate biscuits speckled with cornflakes, smothered in chocolate icing and adorned with a walnut on top.
These flavours, ingredients and fond memories were the inspiration for this recipe, taking everything we love about the afghan biscuit and reimagining it as a cupcake. To start with, I’ve flipped the afghan upside down by having a moist chocolate cupcake speckled with walnut pieces (instead of cornflakes) and topping it off with chocolate buttercream and cornflakes (instead of the walnut). Not only is this Afghan Cupcake delicious and filled with the flavours we love about the iconic biscuit, it looks super fun too.
- 80g Dark Chocolate
- 180g Plain Flour
- 30g Cocoa
- 180g Caster Sugar
- ½ Teaspoon Baking Soda
- 70g Walnuts
- 2 Eggs
- 120ml Coffee – Cooled
- 120ml Buttermilk
- 100ml Oil
- 90g Dark Chocolate
- 150g Butter – Room Temperature
- 270g Icing Sugar
- 2 Tablespoon Milk
- Cornflakes
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Turn the oven onto 180°C bake and line a cupcake tin with 12 cupcake cases, and then set aside.
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Add the flour, cocoa, sugar and baking soda into a medium sized mixing bowl. Then, chop up the chocolate and walnuts until they roughly resemble a coarse breadcrumb texture. Add this in with the other dry ingredients and mix everything together.
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Using a free-standing mixer or in a medium sized bowl with a hand-held beater, mix together the oil, buttermilk, eggs and cooled coffee. To make the cooled coffee, simply add ½ Tablespoon of instant coffee to 120mls of water. Beat these wet ingredients together until well combined.
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While still beating, slowly add the dry ingredients in with the wet until everything comes together as a smooth mixture. Then, pour mixture into a jug and carefully fill cupcake cases to just over two-thirds full.
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Bake for between 16-20 minutes or until the cupcakes spring back when touched and/or skewer comes out clean. Remove cupcakes from the oven and let them cool completely before making the buttercream.
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When it's time to make the buttercream, melt the chocolate in a heatproof bowl over a pot of simmering water or in a microwave. Once melted, leave chocolate to cool for 5-10 minutes.
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Meanwhile in a medium sized bowl, beat the butter with a hand-held beater (or using a free-standing mixer) for 5 minutes, scraping the sides down occasionally. Sift the icing sugar and then add to the butter in two stages, beating for another 3 minutes between additions.
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On a slow speed add in the milk, then beat on high for another 5 minutes. Then, slowly pour in the melted chocolate and continue to beat for a few more minutes.
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Once the cupcakes have cooled, pipe a big round blob of chocolate buttercream on the top of each cupcake and roll or press the crunchy cornflakes over and around the top. Enjoy.
Flashback!
The Afghan Cupcake was the first recipe ever added to the Baker Gatherer website when it was registered in August of 2015, making this recipe the oldest on the website. Above is the first and only photo taken of this recipe when it was first shared in August of 2015, and it took me 7 years to come back to revisit and tweak this recipe, change the copy, and take some new photos. What a journey Baker Gatherer has been on, and so neat to be able to give this recipe some added love and the appreciation it deserves. Happy baking!
Only by the photo already seems too tasty. I will try it out.
Thanks For Sharing this Amazing Recipe. My Family Loved It. I will be sharing this Recipe with my Friends. Hope They will like it.