Christmas Tree Cupcakes

Sous Chef J has been invited to a party. He decided be wanted to take some party food and wanted to try to make a Christmas Tree Cupcake.

So, we made a batch of cake mix - using 200g Dove's Farm gluten free Self Raising, 200g butter (room temperature), 200g caster sugar and 2 large eggs, beaten.  The butter and sugar was creamed using an electric hand mixer, then the flour and egg were added in 3 batches making sure it was all mixed well between each addition.  Next the mix was divided between 15 festive cupccake cases and baked at 170ºC for 12-15 minutes.  When a skewer was inserted and came out clean, the cakes were place, still in the tin, to cool for 10 minutes after which they were removed from the tin and allowed to cool completely.

Once completely cool, the decoration began.  We used this buttercream icing recipe

• 200 g butter, at room temperature
• 250 g icing sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 tbsp fluid (we used water but milk is OK)
• green food colouring

So, the icing was added to a bag which had a C4 nozzle. 

 Then swirls of the icing were piped, inexpertly, onto each cake.  Sous Chef J then sprinkled coloured sugar crystals on (to make the baubles).  

 As a finishing touch, we used some gold dust to coat white chocolate stars and these were placed at the top of the trees.
 

We displayed them on our cupcake tree stand.









Then the cakes were placed in a 'suitable carrier' ready for off... 

Festive foody fun for all! 

Hamster heaven

Wow. What a lot of lovely lot of following/followers we have on twitter. I happened to see a tweet from cupcake maker extraordinaire @MrsAitchB the other day where she was sharing pics of her magnificent animal decorations (she is also know as the Cupcake Artisan).  I asked whether she did a hamster, which of course she did, and she kindly offered to send a pic to Sous Chef J.

Well, you can imagine the delight when, instead of a picture of hammy, this amazing parcel was delivered to us today...  

Not only did it have a card with the hamster pic on, but also some freshly made Gluten Free cupcakes and a specially made hamster cupcake decoration too!

@MrsAitchB had written a note to tell us we need to eat the cupcakes today - so that's what we'll be doing...  Sous Chef J says he will try to remember to take a few pics of his decorations before he eats the cakes but can't promise anything.  An update will be posted if he manages it.

Thanks again, @MrsAitchB.  You are extremely talented and we appreciate your kindness greatly.

Evening Update - the decorated cakes...