Normally, I am a soft serve chocolate ice cream kind of girl. But there is an ice cream place near where I grew up that has the very, very best soft ice cream I have ever had. Ever. When I go “home” to visit family, I usually finagle a way for us all to go for ice cream and then I treat myself to a banana split. That’s what these cupcakes from Heat Oven to 350 remind me of. Ah…good memories.
Banana Split Cupcakes
Ingredients:
1 (18.25 oz) yellow cake mix, divided
1 cup water
1 cup mashed ripe bananas
3 eggs
1 cup chopped drained maraschino cherries
1 cup miniature semi-sweet chocolate chips, divided
1 1/2 cups prepared vanilla frosting*
1 cup marshmallow Fluff (Fluff works the best and doesn’t make the frosting runny)
30 whole maraschino cherries, drained and patted dry
If you have time you can substitute your favorite vanilla frosting for the canned frosting in the recipe
Directions:
1. Heat oven to 350 degrees. Line 30 regular-size (2 1/2 inch) muffin cups with paper muffin cup liners.
2. Reserve 2 T cake mix in a small bowl. Combine remaining cake mix, water, bananas and eggs in a large bowl. Beat at low speed of an electric mixer until moistened, about 30 seconds. Beat at medium speed 2 minutes. Pat chopped cherries dry with a paper towel (I try to squeeze a lot of moisture out here) and combine with reserved cake mix in small bowl. Stir chopped cherry mixture and 1 cup chocolate chips into batter.
3. Spoon batter into prepared muffin cups. Bake 15 to 20 minutes or until toothpick inserted into centers comes out clean. Cool in pans on wire racks 10 minutes. Remove to wire racks; cool completely.
4. Combine frosting and marshmallow fluff in medium bowl until well blended. Frost each cupcake with frosting mixture.
Yield: About 30 cupcakes
