These desserts are so tiny, I’m hesitant to say too much in my post: these were not great, but they have a great form and so they may end up in a holiday basket just for their darling appearance.
The chocolate cake is kind of dry and I’m not digging the orange-chocolate combination. I would have preferred instant espresso powder to deepen the flavor. BUT, the hard white chocolate topping and mini-muffin cup size is wonderful – totally different from anything else I’ve made, and so I might make them again just for the aesthetics.
You’ll find the recipe at Two Scientists Experimenting in the Kitchen (who photographed them is a darling cake dome!). I have a few suggestions to enhance Dorie’s advice:
1) Use a tablespoon of batter in each mini muffin cup, but a teaspoon. These barely rose at all.
2) Butter the muffin cups really well or else use paper liners. The batter looked so slick I might have skimped on the Crisco, and I had a really hard time getting them out of the pan. Several buttons were lost in the process.
3) Skip the orange in favor of almond extract, espresso, or mint even.