Espresso Buttercream Devil's Food Cupcakes

No post last week due to a small miracle added to our family last week. Ellery Jane is finally here and she's beautiful! While we were in the city, I saw cupcake trucks

and visited several cupcake stores. Magnolia was my favorite. I went to the NY store on the east side. A shop to visit. Wood floors, curtains and little tables made this place the best. A great place for a cappacino and a cupcake! I even ate a cupcake which I usually don't do! I picked Vanilla/Vanilla with tiny pink sprinkles in honor of Ellery Jane. Most of the stores seemed to focus on vanilla, chocolate and red velvet. Some had variations with the frosting just as I do.
So back to baking. I have 3 parties this weekend. I'll write about the store order today. Pumpking Bars are in season so I made one tray of them and moved on to cupcakes. As the store doesn't really like different types of cake, I need to change up the icing each week. So this week a jar of espresso coffee caught my attention and I went with it. The result was delicious! I think I may have to say it's my favorite. At least for this week!

Espresso Buttercream

2 sticks of unsalted butter (softened)
6 cups of powdered sugar (sifted)
1/3 cup of whole milk
Medglia D'oro Instant Espresso Powder

In a bowl, mix the butter, sugar and 1/3 cup of milk for 4 minutes until smooth.
Gradually add the additional cups of sugar.
Now for the espresso. Take a tbs of espresso and mix with a very small amount of hot water until disolved.
Add 2 tsp of this to the buttercream.
You will have to play around with the amount of espresso powder used but do not make it too watery as it will thin your icing out.
The result is a light mocha colored frosting with the espresso flavor. Frost the cupcakes and sprinkle a tiny amount of espresso on top of each.

Let me know what you think!