Vanilla Bean cupcakes with Toasted Marshmallow frosting...not quite a success

I think now is the perfect time for me to finally upload this photo. 

It's a vanilla bean cupcake (overbaked. Oops!) with toasted marshmallow frosting (which was a major fail, let me tell ya).  Now, I'm still trying to figure out how to put the links to the sites where I got the recipes from.

But first! May I bother you with what went wrong on this particular cupcake?
I'll try to make it short but I'm not going to promise. So... this wasn't the first time I've tried baking a cupcake but after the very first one (a red velvet cupcake with Nutella frosting which I totally just winged) and a couple more times (chocolate cupcakes twice, one with a frosting I can't remember and the second with what they call 7-minute frosting) I didn't bother to try to do another cupcake recipe anymore. 

But a good few months after I last made said cupcakes, I knew I had to try and make some again.  Oh, I did promise this one's going to be short, so here's what happened.

The instructions on the cupcake recipe were easy to follow though I used vanilla bean paste instead of the vanilla extract as indicated. Why, you ask? Well... I've had this tiny tub of vanilla bean paste for quite a while and I've just been dying to use it on any recipe so I could finally know what it is. 

Though it gave the cupcake a really nice vanilla bean-flecked exterior which excited me big time, the taste on the other hand didn't really taste more vanilla-ey. I expected the vanilla flavor to be more intense because it's a paste but should and is it really more intense than the extract variety? Somebody enlighten me.  

It could also be because I overbaked the crap out of it. I mean it's not that dry like a cold French fry but is dry in cupcake standards. My fault. 

Now the frosting ( Toasted Marshmallow Buttercream Frosting ) ! 

The instructions were also easy to follow and yet I totally left the cut up marshmallows toasting for so long they basically melted and became real sticky and eventually clumped up on the edge of the baking sheet and clogged the crap out of the piping tip I was using that day. 

I topped these cupcakes with these rainbow nonpareils and teeny tiny dark chocolate chips.

The end.

Of course I'll post an update if ever I gather the guts to attempt this particular combo again. It may be soon. Or not.

Have a nice day! Or evening! Or noon!