Rolo Cupcakes with Caramel Frosting and Chocolate Ganache

I found this amazing recipe on Pinterest of all places :) and I knew i had to make them. It just so happened to be a friend's birthday and I figured this would be the perfect treat!

*The recipe for the cupcake batter and chocolate ganache came from myopenfridge.com*

Rolo Cupcakes
makes about 18 cupcakes
1 box Devil's food chocolate cake mix
1/2 cup warm water
4 eggs
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 cup sour cream
1 small package instant chocolate pudding
unwrapped Rolos candies, 2 per cupcake (one for inside, one for garnish on top)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a muffin tin with cupcake liners and set aside. In a large bowl, combine all ingredients except Rolos. With an electric mixer on low speed, mix to combine. Raise speed to medium and blend for about 2 minutes, stopping to scrape down the bowl. Scoop batter into prepared cupcake pans, filling almost to the top of the liner. Press one Rolo into each cup of batter. Bake at 350 degrees for 18-23 minutes or until cupcakes spring back when lightly touched. Remove from oven and allow to cool 5 minutes. Remove from pans and allow to fully cool on wire racks.

Chocolate Ganache:
1/4 cup Heavy Cream
1 cup chocolate chips
1 tablespoon honey
1/2 teaspoon vanilla

In a microwave safe dish, heat cream just until simmering (likely 30 seconds or less on high power, watch it closely!). Stir in chocolate chips. Allow to sit a couple minutes to allow chocolate to fully melt. Stir mixture until smooth. Stir in honey and vanilla. Allow to cool until almost room temperature.

Now for the frosting...uh can I say how much I HATE making frosting. There was a frosting recipe to go along with these cupcakes and it didn't turn out for me at all. Maybe it was me or maybe the recipe, but thats besides the point. So I found a different recipe and it also didn't work..at this point figured It was definitely me that was screwing things up. So because I had used all my ingredients for the TWO previous frostings I headed to the store to buy some more ingredients for a whole different recipe. By this time tears were shed and my sweet husband called up our sister in law in hopes that she could help me figure out how to get that dang frosting to the consistency I needed. So back from the store and onto my THIRD frosting, and what do ya know..I failed again. I started to clean up my gigantic mess I had made in the kitchen and figured our friend would just have to go with some cookies I had previously made. Then my crazy self decided to try just ONE more time. So I did. I didn't have a recipe, but made one up in hopes that I could finally make one that worked. Seriously how can frosting be this hard!! So at 12:30 a.m my frosting finally WORKED! Yay! I had never been so excited about frosting before. So without further ado here is the frosting that saved my cupcakes.

Frosting:

4 oz. Cream Cheese

3/4 Cup Powdered Sugar

6 oz. Cool Whip

1/2 Cup Caramel Syrup (add more or less totally just depends on how strong you want the caramel flavor)

Directions:

Whip the cream cheese. (Do this to avoid clumps, learned this in one of my many attempts) Then add powdered sugar, cool whip, and caramel syrup. Whip until well combined.