Wednesday, July 7, 2010

Cupcakes for all

Cupcakes

Everyone loves a cupcake. A miniature cake in your hand. Mess-free and fuss-free. Handy serving portions to easily pass around.  Easy to store and great for picnics too. They can be dressed up for high tea or casually left unadorned for easy outdoor treats. There's a cupcake for any age, for any occasion.

Cupcakes

Cupcakes

I have a basic cupcake recipe that I manipulate to suit the occasion. Piped, coloured butter icing to top it off creates a pretty finish but isn't absolutely necessary to fully enjoy these flavoursome treats.

Cupcakes


Cupcakes

I sometimes add cocoa or coconut to this cupcake mixture as well. You could also flavour with orange or lemon zest if desired.

Cupcakes

I recently made these blue marbled cupcakes by colouring half the cupcake mixture with blue food colouring and then marbling the two colours together in the cupcake liner. Be imaginative!

Cupcakes

Recipe

You will need:


125g margarine (or butter- see comments below)
1/2 cup sugar
2 eggs
2 cups flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp vanilla essence
1.5- 2 cups milk

Icing:
125g butter
1 tsp vanilla essence
1.5 cups icing sugar
2 tablespoons milk

Beat together the softened margarine and sugar till smooth and creamy. Add the eggs and beat together.
Add the flour, baking powder, vanilla essence and mix together lightly. Gradually add the milk to achieve a dropping consistency.
Place the cupcake liners in a muffin tray. Fill the liners till three-quarter full.
Bake in a pre-heated oven at 180°C for about 25 minutes till done. A toothpick inserted in the middle of the cupcake should come out clean.

You can enjoy them just as is or ice with butter icing.
To make the icing beat together the softened butter and icing sugar till smooth and creamy. Add vanilla essence. You can adjust the consistency of the cream to make it easier to pipe onto the cupcakes by adding milk.
They're a treat for anytime!

10 comments:

  1. That is divine! Cupcakes are the perfect sweet tooth satisfier.. Mm.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Margarine?!? On a fancy food site? You GOT to be kidding. Please get yourself to the butter camp for some good taste, and never put marg... eh, I don't even want to have to type that word again... in a recipe again. Butter is better, for ever and always.

    ReplyDelete
  3. You made today's Foodbuzz Top 9! They're so pretty, love the cupcake liners.

    ReplyDelete
  4. You may be outraged to see the use of margarine in this recipe but actually in my experience these cupcakes actually taste better with a block of Stork margarine compared to using butter. I'm also pretty health conscious so if I can achieve a slightly healthier dish without compromising on taste, I will persist with it! You can ofcourse use butter if you wish!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Gorgeous cupcake pictures! Just want to reach in and take a bite :)

    ReplyDelete
  6. Thank you all for your kind comments. This blog post made the Top 9 on Foodbuzz! These cupcakes are a definite winner for taste too.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Oh well done to make the Top 9! Lovely looking cupcakes. When I was growing up in Malaysia, butter was prohibitively expensive so I baked with margarine all the time, the taste was fine. Have to say I'm a butter girl now though, cos Australia has such good butter! :)

    ReplyDelete
  8. Great Pictures! They are making me salivate all over my screen!

    ReplyDelete
  9. These look lovely I will be trying this recipe out. Thanks so much for sharing.

    ReplyDelete