Ice cream cupcakes

Thanks to my good friend Corrina who introduced me to the idea of ice cream cupcakes for the first time. Ideal for kids and big kids too! Finding the correct wafers can be tricky as a lot of shops only stock the long narrow ones.

Ingredients
To make 12
200g Plain flour
40g Cocoa
240g Caster sugar
3 Tsp Baking powder
80g Unsalted butter
2 eggs
200ml Milk
2 Tsp Vanilla essence
Box of wafer cones
Flakes to decorate

Icing
226g Butter softened
600g Icing sugar
2 Tsp Vanilla essence
4Tbsp Milk

Method

1. Heat the oven to 180 degrees.
2. In a large bowl mix flour, cocoa, baking powder, and salt and whisk.
3. In another bowl whisk butter and sugar until fluffy. Add vanilla and eggs abit at a time whisking slow.
4. Add milk and flour mix alternatively.
5. Place the wafer in a bun tray puttin one wafer everywhere a bun case should be. Spoon the mix into the wafers. Only fill each wafer to half way or they will overflow.
6. Bake for 18 -20 min. Allow to cool.
7. For the icing whisk the butter for 3 minutes. Sift in the icing sugar, and beat on low speed for 1 min. Add vanilla and milk beat for 3 minutes. 
8. Pipe the frosting onto the cupcakes like you would see on an ice cream cone. Place a flake ontop and cover in sprinkles.

Reeses chocolate chip peanut butter cups

I dunno what possessed me to try and make these but the idea came to me and I said shur how hard can it be! Plus the peanut butter cups were half price in the shop :).

Ingredients
Unsalted butter for greasing
175g Plain flour sifted
1 Tsp Baking powder
125g Margarine melted
85g Light muscovado sugar
55g Caster sugar
1/2Tsp Vanilla essence
1 egg
125g Plain chocolate chips
Reeses peanut butter cups 12

Method
Pop the peanut butter cups in the freezer 5 min before you start.
1. Preheat the oven to 190 degrees and put bun cases into a bun baking tray. Stay with me here I'm not mad I swear!
2. Place all the ingredients in a large mixing bowl and beat until well combined. It feels so good to chuck everything in together.
3. Spoon tablespoons of the cookie dough into the bun cases. Don't overfill the cases maybe put 2 tablespoons or a little less into each.
4. Bake for 15 - 20 min keep an eye on them.
5. When they come out of the oven take the peanut butter cups from the freezer and with your hand press them down into the top of each cookie cup. The fact they are slightly frozen keeps them from melting and breaking.

Twirl cupcakes

Continuing my quest to recreate all bars as cupcakes I moved onto the Twirl! Even saying the word makes me want one with a cup of tea. Getting the colour right on this one was important so after getting some purple colouring all that was left was to add yellow somehow. Of course it was after these were done I made the discovery of a 2 colour piping nozzle. Oops.

Ingredients
To make 12 cupcakes

9 oz Plain flour
3 oz Cocoa
3 Tsp Baking powder
17oz Caster sugar
300ml Milk
150 ml Olive oil
2 eggs
300ml Boiling water
Twirls 6

Icing
226g Butter softened
600g Icing sugar
2 Tsp Vanilla essence
4Tbsp Milk
Purple colouring
Yellow chocolate balls

Method
30 min Before starting halve 6 of the Twirl fingers and place in the freezer.
1. Heat the oven to 180 degrees.
2. In a large bowl mix flour, cocoa, baking powder, and sugar.
3. Pour in milk, oil, egg and beat until smooth.
4. Pour in boiling water and beat.
5. Pour into cases, adding a frozen Twirl into each case and bake for 15 minutes.
6. Allow to cool.
7. For the icing whisk the butter for 3 minutes. Sift in the icing sugar, and beat on low speed for 1 min. Add vanilla and milk beat for 3 minutes.  Add purple food colouring.
8. Pipe the frosting onto the cupcakes and place half a Twirl finger ontop of each one.
9. Sprinkle yellow chocolate balls over the icing.

Coconut Lamingtons

Until now I had never heard of lamingtons. I racewalked before in Lemington spa but thats about as close as it gets! As I searched for inspiration I stumbled across coconut ones and that was it decision made.

Ingredients
Oil or butter for greasing
175g Plain white flour
1Tbsp Baking powder
175g Unsalted butter softened
175g Caster sugar
3 Eggs beaten
1 Tsp Vanilla essence
2 Tbsp Milk
2 Tbsp Desiccated coconut

Icing and coating ingredients
500g Icing sugar
40g Cocoa powder
85ml Boiling water
70g Unsalted butter melted
250g Desiccated coconut

Method

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees. Grease and line a 9 inch square tin. I used a round one recession and all beggers cant be choosers right?

2. Sift the flour and baking powder Into a large bowl and add butter, caster sugar, eggs and vanilla essence. Beat well until the mixture is smooth then stir in the milk and coconut.

3. Spoon the mixture into the tin and smooth the top with a knife. Bake for 30 -35 min until risen and golden brown.

4. Leave to cool. Cut into 16 squares and prepare to create the greatest mess you have ever seen. 

5. For the icing , sift the sugar and cocoa into a bowl. Add water and butter and stir until smooth. Spread the coconut out on a large plate. Dip each square of sponge into the icing then into the coconut covering all sides. I was advised to use a fork to dip but everytime I dipped it fell in so I resorted to dunking with my fingers. Boy it was messy. 

6. Place on baking paper to set.

Double Chocolate Mint Sponge

Who doesn't love mint? Its jaw dropping good :) of course thats just my opinion. I came across this recipe in Edinburgh and couldn't wait to get stuck in. Of course our local shops in Ireland don't exactly have everything so I had to swap a few bits.

Ingredients
Oil or melted butter for greasing
150g plain flour
2 tbsp cocoa
1 tbsp baking powder
175g unsalted butter softened
6oz caster sugar
3 eggs beaten
1 tbsp milk
1 mint aero bar crushed
140g chocolate spread
2 mint crisp bars crushed & frozen
Some melting chocolate

Method
1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees. Grease two 8 inch sandwiche tins and line with baking paper. ( I used 9 inch but sssssh)
2. Sift the flour, cocoa and baking powder into a bowl and beat in the butter, sugar and eggs. Mix until smooth. Add in frozen mint crisp bars and stir in milk.
3.Spread the mixture into the baking tins. Bake for 25 to 30 min until risen and firm. Turn out onto a rack to cool.
4. Sandwiche the 2 cakes together with chocolate spread.  I used Panda :).
5. Sprinkle crushed mint aero over the top and drizzle melted chocolate over it.

I was pleasantly surprised with how it turned out and boy was it tasty! Very simple to make too :)

Nutella Cupcakes

Thankfully I made these before the price of Nutella increased. It was one of my toughest times reading that hazelnuts were becoming scarce so the price would increase :( many a night has been spent devouring it. Time to discover a new comfort food I think. Below is my recipe for Nutella cupcakes.

Ingredients
To make 12 cupcakes

9 oz Plain flour
3 oz Cocoa
3 Tsp Baking powder
17oz Caster sugar
300ml Milk
150 ml Olive oil
2 eggs
300ml Boiling water

Icing
230g Unsalted butter
240g Icing sugar
222g Nutella
3-4Tbsp Heavy cream
2 Tsp Vanilla essence
Sprinkle of salt
Chocolate chips
Hershey' s chocolate sauce

Method

1. Heat the oven to 180 degrees.
2. In a large bowl mix flour, cocoa, baking powder, and sugar.
3. Pour in milk, oil, egg and beat until smooth.
4. Pour in boiling water and beat.
5. Pour into cases, and bake for 15 minutes.
6. Allow to cool.
7. For the icing whisk the butter for 3 minutes. Sift in the icing sugar first then Nutella and beat on  medium speed for 1 min. Add vanilla then the cream and  beat for 3 minutes. 
8. Pipe the frosting onto the cupcakes and sprinkle chocolate chips ontop. Drizzle Hershey's chocolate sauce over it.

Bounty Cupcakes

I'm a big fan of coconut so I figured why not bake with it. As a kid I loved Bounty bars so behold the Bounty cupcake.

Ingredients
To make 12 cupcakes

9 oz Plain flour
3 oz Cocoa
3 Tsp Baking powder
17oz Caster sugar
300ml Milk
150 ml Olive oil
2 eggs
300ml Boiling water
Bounty 6 bars
Desiccated coconut

Icing
226g Butter softened
600g Icing sugar
2 Tsp Vanilla essence
4Tbsp Milk
2oz Cocoa
Desiccated coconut

Method
30 min Before starting halve 6 of the bounty segments and place in the freezer.
1. Heat the oven to 180 degrees.
2. In a large bowl mix flour, cocoa, baking powder, some coconut and sugar.
3. Pour in milk, oil, egg and beat until smooth.
4. Pour in boiling water and beat.
5. Pour into cases, adding a frozen bounty into each case and bake for 15 minutes.
6. Allow to cool.
7. For the icing whisk the butter for 3 minutes. Sift in the icing sugar, cocoa and beat on low speed for 1 min. Add vanilla and milk beat for 3 minutes. 
8. Pipe the frosting onto the cupcakes and place a bounty ontop of each one.
9. Sprinkle coconut over the icing.