The Votes are In

And the winner is....(drum roll please)
CHOCOLATE BUTTERCREAM!

Honestly, nobody actually told me which they liked better, despite me asking them to. D's opinion, which I highly value in all things food related, was that the chocolate buttercream and peanut butter chocolate chip cupcakes were a little more subtle and nuanced, more what you would find at a fine dining establishment (if fancy restaurants sold cupcakes). The peanut butter chunk frosting was more bakery-style, and tasted like a big Reese's peanut butter cup, where the frosting was pretty indistinguishable from the cake. Just as I had suspected. Basically, if you really like peanut butter, go with the peanut butter frosting, but if you're so so about the nutty flavor, go with the chocolate. Tasting my overly buttery little buttercream on the cake was heavenly, so much better that way and not just spooned out of the bowl. It was very lickable too, didn't form too much of a hard crust (maybe because I blended it again last night--it had gotten too hard to spread from its night in the fridge). As far as the little cakes are concerned, they were moist and a little muffiny, not too sweet. If I were craving peanut butter muffins, I'd make the same recipe but add more chocolate chips (there were only about 4 in each cake) and flour them because they all sank to the bottom. Then, while they were still hot, I'd "frost" them with creamy peanut butter. Yum!

Praise for the cupcakes:

"I loved them both." --D
"bakery worthy"--Colleen
"[The buttercream frosting] has a nice mouth feel"--Emily (she voted for the peanut butter frosting for taste but buttercream won out in the ever important mouth feel category)

They like me, they really like me.