Owl Cupcakes...

Cupcakes have to be one of life's simple pleasures a mini cake in an assortment of flavours topped off with a sticky sweet swirl of deliciousness.  However disappointingly I have had a few experiences where cupcakes look so delicious and tasty with all there toppings and sprinkles but once bitten into are dry and lack flavour. Thankfully these cute little owl cupcakes are moist chocolatey and an absolute delight to look at.

I could spend hours decorating cupcakes and I probably did making these too. These cupcakes are a rich moist chocolate sponge recipe adopted from the hummingbird bakeries book, one of my favourites for any cupcake orientated recipe. I chose to make both vanilla and chocolate frosting as some people find chocolate cake with chocolate frosting a little too rich, particularly my mum.

The owl decorations involved halving an Oreo for both eyes, making sure there was white filling on both sides of the biscuit (trust me this is harder than it looks) and smarties for the eyes and nose.

For the two tone cupcakes a star tip was used vanilla icing was filled into one piping bag, and chocolate in the other both piping bags were then placed into a piping back with a star icing nozzle at the end. Once swirled onto the cakes this creates an effective and simple two tone effect.

Chocolate Cupcakes:

• 100g self-raising flour
• 20g cocoa powder
• 140g caster sugar
• 1 1/2tsp baking powder
• a pinch of salt
• 40g unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 120ml whole milk
• 1 egg
• ¼tsp vanilla extract

Method:

1. Put the flour, cocoa powder, sugar, baking powder, salt and butter in a freestanding electric mixer with a paddle attachment and beat on slow speed until you get a sandy consistency and everything is combined.
2. Whisk the milk, egg and vanilla extract together in a jug, then slowly pour about half into the flour mixture, beat to combine and turn the mixer up to high speed to get rid of any lumps.
3. Turn the mixer down to a slower speed and slowly pour in the remaining milk mixture, mix until the batter is smooth
4. Using an ice cream scoop pour the mixture into the paper cases until 2/3 full bake for 20-25 minutes, a cocktail stick inserted should come out clean
5. Leave the cupcakes until cold

Chocolate Frosting 

• 300g icing sugar, sifted
• 100g unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 40g cocoa powder, sifted
• 40ml whole milk

Method:

1. Beat the icing sugar, butter and cocoa powder together in a freestanding electric mixer with a paddle attachment (or use a handheld electric whisk) on medium-slow speed until the mixture comes together and is well mixed.
2. Turn the mixer down to slow speed. Add the milk to the butter mixture a couple of tablespoons at a time. Once all the milk has been incorporated, turn the mixer up to high speed.
3. Continue beating until the frosting is light and fluffy, about 5 minutes.

Its important that the cupcakes are completely cool before you start to pipe otherwise you will end up with a melting sticky mess.

Happy Baking 

x

Chocolate Orange Dream

My housemates are bigggg chocolate orange fans and so after handing in my dissertation I thought I’d celebrate. Any normal person would probably go to the pub and celebrate with a glass of wine but i decided to celebrate by baking, obviously aided with a bottle of wine.

This recipe was adopted from Mary Berry’s chocolate and orange cake, i chose to add the juice of an orange to make the orange flavour that little more intense. The result; a perfectly balanced rich chocolate cake with a mouth watering orange flavour, what a dream combination.

Chocolate Orange Cake

• 100g unsalted butter, softened, plus extra for greasing
• 50g good quality cocoa powder
• 90ml boiling water
• 3 large free-range eggs
• 4 tbsp milk
• 175g self-raising flour, sifted
• 1 rounded tsp baking powder, sifted into the flour
• 300g golden caster sugar
• Finely grated zest of 1 orange
• Juice of half an orange

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180ºC/fan160°C/gas 4. Grease 3 x 20cm round sandwich tins and line the bases with baking paper.
2. Measure the cocoa and boiling water into a large bowl and mix to a paste. Add the remaining ingredients and beat again until combined
3. Divide the sponge mixture evenly between the prepared tins. Bake in the preheated oven for about 20-25 minutes until the sponges are well risen and shrinking away from the sides of the tin. Remove the sponges from the oven, turn out of their tins onto a cooling rack and leave to cool completely

Chocolate Orange Ganache

• 200g dark chocolate
• 200ml double cream
• Half grated orange
• 2 tbsp icing sugar

1.  For the icing and filling, put the chocolate and cream in a bowl, Then stand over a pan of simmering water for 10 minutes until melted (don’t let the bowl touch the water), stirring from time to time. Set aside to cool until it thickens to a spreadable consistency
2. Add the grated orange and shift in the icing sugar stir until combined
3. To finish spread the top of two sponges with the icing and put on top of each other. Cover the top of the cake with the remainder of the icing, then grate any left over orange zest on the top