Ultra Mini Classic Chocolate Whoopie Pies with Raspberry and White Chocolate Mascarpone Filling

Tip:

• Use a large ziplock bag to pipe your batter onto parchment paper and your whoopie pies will be almost perfectly symmetrical instead of trying to shape your pies after you have scooped them onto the paper with a spoon.

I started off my day with "Whoopies!" and ended my day with "Owwies!" Yes, I am being a little bit cheesey but everyone needs a little cheese in their life. I broke my toe Friday afternoon in my excited rush to pack clothes to travel home for a few weeks. My poor poor little itty bitty toe has been the bane of my existence for the last 4 weeks now and is only now showing signs of letting up. It is amazing how such a little thing can have incredible impact on your life. I guess little insignificant things are often times the building blocks to bigger and better things though.

Take my ultra mini Whoopie Pies for example. Barely the size of a quarter, these Whoopie Pies by themselves, unfilled, are nothing special, but put them together with a White Chocolate Cream Filling and Raspberry Preserves and bam!, they pack a powerful punch of taste and sweetness!

I adapted this recipe from a recipe from the book Whoopie Pies posted on www.Bakerella.com. I made only one change to the recipe, reducing the Baking Soda from 1 1/2 teaspoons to 3/4 teaspoon of Baking Soda.

Note: I am currently reading the book Bakewise by Shirley Corriher who uses a mixture of her culinary school skills mixed with science to break down the art of baking to make it perfect. She states if you use too much baking soda, you may over-leaven your cake causing it to actually fall instead of rise. Not only that, you may get that fairly unpleasant soapy taste baking soda by itself seems to leave in its wake. Shirley Corriher recommends using 1/4 teaspoon baking soda to 1 cup of flour. I estimated the flour and cocoa powder together would be roughly over 2 cups of flour and compromised with the recipe's stated 1 1/2 teaspoons of baking soda and made it 3/4 teaspoon, 1/4 per "cup of flour" and 1/4 just as extra.

Classic Chocolate Whoopie
from Whoopie Pies

1 2/3 cups all-purpose flour
2/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda **I used 3/4 tsp baking soda**
1/2 teaspoon salt
4 tablespoons unsalted butter, room temperature
4 tablespoons vegetable shortening
1 cup packed dark brown sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup milk

• Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
• Line baking sheets with parchment paper.
• In a bowl, sift together, flour, cocoa, baking soda, and salt.
• In another bowl, beat butter, shortening and sugar with a mixer on low until just combined. Increase speed to medium and beat for about 3 minutes.
• Add egg and vanilla and beat for two more minutes.
• Add half of the flour mixture and half of the milk and beat on low until incorporated. Repeat with remaining flour and milk and beat until combined.
• Using a tablespoon, drop batter on baking sheet two inches apart. Bake for about 10 minutes each or until pies spring back when pressed gently. **I poured my batter into a ziplock bag with a small hole at the bottom and squeezed out roughly a little smaller than a quarter of mixture as I wanted them ultra mini and I knew they would spread a little. Using a ziplock bag with batter in it helped tremendously in making my whoopie pies perfectly shaped. I squeezed the ziplock bag over one spot and continued squeezing until the circle size I wanted was achieved. With a teaspoon you sometimes may have slightly more or less mixture in each one and having to scoop and drop over and over becomes tiresome.
  
• Remove from oven and cool for about five minutes before transferring them to a rack to cool completely.

1 Tbsp of batter should make about 48 two-inch cakes or 24 pies.
2 Tbsp of batter should make about 30 four-inch cakes or 15 pies.

For my ultra-mini pies, I had 140 cakes or 70 whoopie pies. I also had enough mixture for probably 30 more assembled whoopie pies but time was short and it was time to get crackin' at the assembly!

White Chocolate and Mascarpone Filling:

In a heavy small saucepan, combine 3 ounces chopped white baking chocolate (with cocoa butter) and 1/4 cup whipping cream. Cook and stir over low heat until chocolate nearly melts. Remove from heat; stir until smooth. Cool for 15 minutes. Meanwhile, in a large bowl, combine 1/2 cup mascarpone cheese and 1/4 cup softened butter. Beat with an electric mixer on medium to high speed until smooth. Beat in 1/2 teaspoon vanilla. Gradually add 4 cups powdered sugar, beating well. Beat in the cooled white chocolate mixture. Chill about 30 minutes or until firm enough to pipe.

To Assemble the Whoopie Pies:

Spread the flat side of half of the cookies with about 1/4 teaspoon raspberry preserves. In a large pastry bag fitted with a small star tip, pipe White Chocolate and Mascarpone Filling over the raspberry preserve layer. Top with the remaining cookies, flat sides down. Chill for 30 minutes before serving.

The Raspberry and White Chocolate Mascarpone Filling was a filling previously used here.. http://www.sweetsandothereats.com/2010/08/mini-raspberry-and-white-chocolate.html

Mini Raspberry and White Chocolate Mascarpone Whoopie Pies,..very tasty!

Tip: If you do not have buttermilk on hand, add one tablespoon of vinegar to 1 cup of milk and let stand for 10 minutes.


I made a go at my very first whoopie pies! These are not your traditional Whoopie Pies! Whoopie Pies began as a Pennsylvania Amish tradition. Made from leftover batter, they were a special treat they would send off in their children's lunch bags. Simple, neat and delicious, these dome shaped pieces of cake with a creamy middle are sure to make you call out "Whoopie!" every time you take a bite.

In some form or fashion, there are constantly cupcakes littering my entire house! The kitchen counter, the refrigerator, the microwave, the freezer, etc. I have left over practice frosting, old cupcakes for practice, cupcakes in the freezer and cupcake books scattering the house... Soner is probably beginning to feel like he walked into an alternate universe and instead of playstation and pizza, he gets Cupcake Wars and cupcakes. Poor guy! No matter how much you may like cupcakes, even I stopping licking the bowl after the first 2 or 3 experimental batches a few weeks ago!

This week I am shaking things up. No more experimental batches for the week (well maybe one more)! I will work on technique and actually baking delicious, already yummy, desserts! So yesterday I began my first foray into Whoopie Pies and if I hadn't been so high on sweets and sugar from all the cupcakes and frostings of the past week, I probably would have yelled "Whoopie!" (if only you could hear me now, I am actually testing out the way Whoopie sounds out loud with joy and excitement in my voice!).

I found this wonderfully decadent looking Whoopie Pie recipe from the Better Homes and Gardens website for Mini Raspberry and White Chocolate Mascarpone Whoopie Pies. Doesn't the name just scream out to you! These Whoopie Pies were very good. Although I did have a little trouble getting them to rise instead of spread.

Side Note: I used an air bake cookie sheet for the first batch but a normal flat cookie sheet worked much better for these little ones. The bottom had a much better texture upon switching the pans.

Mini Raspberry and White Chocholate Mascarpone Whoopie Pies

makes 72 sandwich cookies (fairly accurate if you use a teaspoon to scoop,..I may have ended up with about 60 or so)
Ingredients
1/2 cup butter, softened
1 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup buttermilk
1/2 cup seedless raspberry preserves
White Chocolate and Mascarpone Filling
Colored sugar (optional)

Directions
1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper; set aside.

2. In a large bowl, beat butter with an electric mixer on medium to high speed for 30 seconds. Add sugar, baking soda, and salt. Beat until combined, scraping bowl occasionally. Beat in egg and vanilla until combined. Alternately add flour and buttermilk, beating on low speed after each addition just until mixture is combined. Spoon dough with a teaspoon, 1 inch apart onto prepared cookie sheet.

3. Bake in the preheated oven for 7 to 8 minutes or until tops are set. Cool completely on parchment-lined cookie sheet on a wire rack. Peel cooled cookies off the paper. Spread the flat side of half of the cookies with about 1/4 teaspoon raspberry preserves. In a large pastry bag fitted with a small star tip, pipe White Chocolate and Mascarpone Filling over the raspberry preserve layer. Top with the remaining cookies, flat sides down. If desired, pipe additional filling on top of whoopie pies and/or sprinkle with colored sugar. Chill for 30 minutes before serving. Makes about 72 sandwich cookies.

White Chocolate and Mascarpone Filling: In a heavy small saucepan, combine 3 ounces chopped white baking chocolate (with cocoa butter) and 1/4 cup whipping cream. Cook and stir over low heat until chocolate nearly melts. Remove from heat; stir until smooth. Cool for 15 minutes. Meanwhile, in a large bowl, combine 1/2 cup mascarpone cheese and 1/4 cup softened butter. Beat with an electric mixer on medium to high speed until smooth. Beat in 1/2 teaspoon vanilla. Gradually add 4 cups powdered sugar, beating well. Beat in the cooled white chocolate mixture. Chill about 30 minutes or until firm enough to pipe.

To Store: Place bars in a single layer in an airtight container; cover. Store in refrigerator for up to 3 days or freeze for up to 3 months. Thaw at least 1 hour in refrigerator before serving.

Make sure to melt chocolate and cream on low so as not to burn. Burnt white chocolate tastes likes burnt not-so-goodness.

Wait until the mascarpone cheese reaches room temperature or it may not blend smoothly with the butter.

Add a little powdered sugar at a time to avoid sugar flying everywhere!!

The Mascarpone Cheese before adding the White Chocolate would make a great frosting!

White Chocolate Mixture added in.

You get a wonderfully creamy and smooth mixture that you must refrigerate for about 30 minutes so it will pipe out beautifully.

A little flat but they taste very cake-y and delicious!

Raspberry Preserves spread on every other half.

These Whoopie Pies were absolutely delicious. They were a bit flat but they were the perfect bite size treat. I probably polished off about 4 or 5 before Soner got home just to make sure "they tasted good." I definitely need to figure out why they spread so much and how to make perfectly round pieces because I really enjoyed the taste and would love to make them again. I used a rounded teaspoon and tried to fill it with exactly the same amount each time but the sizes and shapes of the Whoopie Pies never were consistent.

I look forward to trying out more of these treats. I loved the Whoopie Pie almost as much as cupcakes because each "pie" yielded the perfect ratio of sweet fillings to cake. If I could find some fancy way to decorate them, they may become my newest favorite baking item although they do take quite a lot of time and effort.

Side Note: Can anyone tell me why the cake tops were sticky to the touch? My cupcakes sometimes come out like this also. I baked them for the recommended time and actually baked one batch for longer to see if the flattening of the cakes was a structural problem (possibly it fell flat upon taking out of oven because it wasn't finished forming its structure??)