Lay The Table

My basic cupcake recipe

Here’s my basic cupcake recipe! I find beating the eggs and the sugar makes the mixture much more airy than beating the sugar and butter and the batter is really light.

{Makes about 16 normal size cupcakes}

40mins – Prep time: 20 mins – Cooking time: 20mins

Ingredients

4oz golden caster sugar 4oz margarine (I use Stork) 4oz self raising flour 2 medium/large eggs (get them out of the fridge beforehand to warm up to room temp) 1/2 tsp baking powder 1/2 tsp vanilla bean paste/3 drops vanilla essence

Instructions

Oven temp: 160°C/320°F

1. Lay out cupcake cases. If you use silicon you can lay them on a flat baking tray, if you use paper ones, I advise using a bun tin to make the cakes hold their shape
2. Whisk the eggs and sugar for at least 4 minutes with an electric hand whisk and beat air into the mix so it fluffs up.
3. Bit by bit, sieve in the flour and baking powder and add bits of butter, whisking the mixture each time to ensure a smooth texture, until fully mixed, then mix in the vanilla paste or essence.
4. Spoon the mixture evenly into the cupcake cases, ensuring you smooth the tops down (it doesn’t have to be perfect!)
5. Put the cupcakes into the oven for 15-20 minutes until they feel spongey and the tops have got some colour.
6. Once out of the oven, place on a wire cooling rack to cool down

Mar 07, 2010 | Cupcakes | 1 Comment »

Rolling Stones 40 Licks Cupcakes

I entered a cupcake competition at the weekend and the theme was music. I didn’t have any ideas in mind so I asked my twitter friends for ideas and one of them came up with the idea!

The cupcakes themselves use the red velvet recipe I tried before.

For the tongues and lips I used flowerpaste and made the items a couple of nights before so they would harden up a bit. I used gel food colouring to colour them – unfortunately I couldn’t get it to turn bright red! To make the templates, print out the image below twice, cutting out the tongue on one. On the other, draw in the rest of the lips and cut them out.

I then cut around the lip templates using the pink/red flowerpaste then I gently brushed them with strawberry jam and sprinkled them with red sanding sugar. Then I cut out the tongues using the pink flowerpaste, and left them to dry with the lips. When they had hardened and dried, I used white writing icing to accent the lips and tongue.

I made some cream cheese buttercream and piped it on using a piping bag, then sprinkled a few edible gold stars on. Then I added the lips and put the tongue on so it poked out.

Nom and roll!

Feb 24, 2010 | Cupcakes | 1 Comment »

Red velvet cupcakes – a fraught day in the kitchen

These red velvet cupcakes have been causing me trauma today! I’ve been trying to learn how to make a swirly frosting like in this video:

Unfortunately the recipe I used was for a large red velvet cake, not cupcakes and the frosting wasn’t strong enough to hold the shape when trying to create swirls on top. Instead I found a batch of pre-made vanilla buttercream in the cupboard and used that to practice. I also made my own sugar sand really easily.

These cupcakes make perfect Valentines cupcakes – you can sprinkle these edible heart sprinkles on top too for that loving feeling. Despite being a really thick batter, they are incredibly light.

The recipes I used for the cupcakes is from Red Velvet Cake recipe from Joy Of Baking.com.

Red velvet cupcakes are tradionally frosted with cream cheese but you will need a stiffer mix like this recipe for cream cheese frosting All Recipes.com. Or you could just use a vanilla buttercream recipe – just make sure to put it in the fridge so it stiffens up if you make it yourself. Make swirly frosting on the top of the cupcakes as in the video.

I pre-prepared the sugar by mixing 6tbsp of granulated sugar with 1tsp red liquid food colouring. I stirred it well to ensure all the sugar was red then turned it onto a plate with a piece of kitchen roll to dry it out. Once dried, split up any big pieces with the back of a spoon.

Gently sprinkle the sugar on top of the cupcakes.

Jan 31, 2010 | Cupcakes | 1 Comment »

Chocolate orange cupcakes

Add some zing to your chocolate cupcakes with a hint of orange!

50mins – Prep time: 35mins – Cooking time: 15mins

Ingredients

Cake mixture

• 200g self raising flour
• 170g caster sugar
• 170g margarine
• 80g dark chocolate
• 3 eggs
• 6 drops orange essence
• 4 tbsp juice from orange
• 1 tsp baking powder.
• Rind 1/2 an orange

Topping

• 120g butter
• 250g icing sugar
• 3tbsp juice from orange
• 3 drops orange essence
• 80g plain chocolate
• Ringe 1/2 an orange to decorate

Instructions

Oven temp: 180°C/320°F

1. Lay out cupcake cases (about 18). If you use silicon you can lay them on a flat baking tray, if you use paper ones, I advise using a bun tin to make the cakes hold their shape.
2. Whisk the eggs and sugar for at least 4 minutes with an electric hand whisk and beat air into the mix so it fluffs up.
3. Bit by bit, sieve in the flour and baking powder and add bits of butter, whisking the mixture each time to ensure a smooth texture, until fully mixed, then mix in the orange essence and rind.
4. Melt the chocolate and spoon into the chocolate and mix in too.
5. Spoon the mixture evenly into the cupcake cases, ensuring you smooth the tops down (it doesn’t have to be perfect!)
6. Put the cupcakes into the oven for 10-15 minutes until they feel spongey on top.
7. Remove from the oven and allow to cool thoroughly. Meanwhile begin make the frosting by melting the chocolate.
8. Mix the butter, icing sugar and orange juice and essence until the mixture goes pale and fluffy, then add the chocolate.
9. Pipe chocolate buttercream onto the cupcakes and finish with a few strangs of orange rind

Nov 10, 2009 | Cupcakes | Leave A Comment »

Strawberry & pomegranate cupcakes with lemon cream

Make the best of summer fruits and enjoy a British tradition, stawberries and cream, with a twist! The best thing is these aren’t too sweet, with the lemon just curbing the sweetness of the strawberries.

20mins – Cooking time: 1hr – 1 1/2hrs

{Serves: 3-4}

Ingredients

16 basic cupcakes {see here for the basic cupcake recipe}

Lemon cream

• 3 tbsp fresh lemon juice
• 400ml fresh double cream
• 4tbsp icing sugar

Icing

• 200g icing sugar
• blue food paste
• water

Decoration

• 1 punnet organic strawberries (they’re nice and small and fit on the cupcakes)
• 50g pomegranate

Instructions

1. Make the icing by adding a few drops off water to the icing sugar until it’s a thick but spreadable consistency, then add colouring as desired. Ice the cupcakes by picking up a teaspoonful and gently smoothing into a circle on the top of the cupcake.
2. Make the lemon cream by combining all the ingredients and gently whisking with an electric hand mixer until it forms stiff peaks. Don’t overdo it though!
3. Using a star tip, pipe the lemon cream into a swirl on the top of the cupcakes, leaving some of the blue icing visible.
4. Decorate by gently placing a strawberry onto the top of the cupcake and placing 4 pieces of pomegranate around the lemon cream swirl.

Jul 26, 2009 | Cupcakes | 1 Comment »