Watermelon cupcakes
I saw these Watermelon cupcakes in my Google Reader and I thought they were so cute. Like the perfect summery treat. We were going to a cookout last weekend and I immediately thought of these cupcakes. I wanted to be able to pipe the frosting, so I opted not to flavor them with watermelon. I also didn’t think chocolate and watermelon really go together… So I guess mine are just watermelon look-alike cupcakes.
I made the same chocolate chip cupcakes that I made for the 4th of July, but this time I used mini chips and added some pink and red food coloring to the batter. For the frosting, I made my favorite buttercream. I actually made two shades of green that I wanted to swirl together. The swirling didn’t go as planned, so really all you can see is dark green frosting, not the lighter lime green frosting. Everyone enjoyed the summery (looking) cupcakes. 
Chocolate Chip cupcakes – adapted from Vanilla cupcakes from Crazy Delicious – original recipe from Martha Stewart – makes 24
1 3/4 cups cake flour, not self-rising
1 1/4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
2 cups sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, cut into 1-inch cubes
4 large eggs
1 cup whole milk
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 cup mini chocolate chips + 1 Tbsp flour (toss to coat chocolate chips)
Few drops pink and red food coloring
Mix the dry ingredients
Add butter
Whisk eggs, milk and vanilla
Add wet ingredients 1/3 at a time to the dry ingredients
Stir in food coloring and chocolate chips – be sure to coat the chips with flour so they don’t all sink to the bottom while baking
Bake for 17-22 minutes at 325 degrees or until a toothpick comes out clean
Vanilla and Buttercream
2 sticks butter
7 cups powdered sugar, sifted
1/4 cup milk – I used whole milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
Few drops green and yellow food coloring
Beat butter until creamy, scrape bowl
Add 5 cups of sifted powdered sugar, milk, and vanilla, beat until combined. Add food coloring until desired color is reached.
Add more powdered sugar until you get to the consistency you want (not too stiff so that its hard to pipe)
I am Jen the Beantown Baker. Engineer by day and baking maven by night. Hubby serves as my #1 fan and official taste tester. We got hitched back in 2006. Barefoot. In the sand. With the waves crashing behind us. It was one of the best decisions we’ve ever made. 
Jen, I totally love your blog. You always ahve the BEST treats! I LOVE the picture with all the cookies resting on the m&ms. GREAT idea! 🙂
Looks beautiful as always!
perfect use of pink! So interesting about how the cookies reacted to the way you rolled them! Thanks for the heads up!
Your cookies look great and that’s a good tip about getting them to look their best too. My kids and all their friends love these cookies. I’ve made them a few times since I first posted them and they never last long.
thanks for the link!
~ Michelle
Those are beautiful and perfect for such a great cause
What an adorable picture! Also helps that they are for a great cause! 🙂
M&Ms are my favorite treat and I love that during this month everything is PINK! The cookies look fantastic.
I am bummed I missed your Power of Pink contest as I was utilizing October to raise awareness around breast cancer too! I made some cookies and have a post on my site: http://katskitchenplace.blogspot.com/2009/10/october-is-breast-cancer-awareness.html
I like the chocolate cookie base of your cookies! Thank you for sharing. Looking forward to checking back and seeing all what people make towards your challenge 🙂
A chocolate cookie topped with chocolate candies? What could be better? Perhaps a tall, ice cold glass of milk to go with them! They look divine. I’m wondering if you might skip the rolling and flattening by creating a wide log of dough (without M&Ms), slicing to the thickness desired, then pressing candies on top? Seems like the dough might be fairly easy to shape into a log. A quick pop into the fridge before slicing would help firm it up. Just a thought! I can’t wait to try them.
Best,
Casey
http://www.tastestopping.wordpress.com
P.S. Not sure if I’ve invited you before, but I’d love to publish any of your photos that FoodGawker and TasteSpotting decline! Thanks. 😀
I love the dark chocolate and pink M&M contrast. What fantastic cookies:)
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I just made your recipe for these cookies yesterday and took them to church. The kids went nuts and they’ve never turned out as pretty as they did this time. Thanks for the helpful tips because my m&m cookies have never turned out prettier! 9 minutes was also perfect timing as well.
Both pretty and I’m sure delicious! I love how you showed the comparison between batches to give better suggestions for prettier cookies. The final batch are definitely the prettiest of the bunch. I love that the pink pops w/the chocolate cookie.