The Easter Rabbit

The Easter Rabbit in a cupcake.

This idea was inspired by a very talented lady, namely Astral De La Mare @ The Art of Being Perfect.  She produced some cupcakes a while ago in the theme of Alice in Wonderland, in which she designed a rabbit theme cupcake, along with a clock cupcake to match "I'm late, I'm late for a very important date! No time to say hello, goodbye; I'm late, I'm late, I'm late!"

So, I figured that because it was Easter this weekend, instead of buying my boyfriend's parents Easter Eggs - lets face it, it is too hot for chocolate - I would make them some Easter themed cupcakes.  These are great for adults and children, and always make a more interesting Easter present.

The cakes - plain vanilla cupcake.

The mud butter cream - standard chocolate butter cream, using a nozzle I injected the frosting in to the middle of the cupcake and then gently eased it out to give a muddy effect, so that it appeared like the rabbit was in a hole.  Do this first and then spread the green 'grass' butter cream around it.

The grass butter cream - peppermint flavoured frosting with two capfuls of green colouring.  This is spread on with a flat knife and then spiked up in a jabbing motion.

The rabbit ears - using sliced up regal icing, I pointed the ears at the top and then shaped them.  I made some of the ears floppy and some of them slightly bent at the top.  Paint them in with red colouring to make them look like real rabbit ears.  Then stick them in the chocolate butter cream.

Then add a bit of glitter on the grass for some sparkle and then eat!

I hope you enjoy these cupcakes!  Many thanks to The Art of Being Perfect for her inspiration! 

Have a fantastic Easter weekend!

After Eight

These are my 'After Eight' cupcakes, I've been meaning to blog about these for a while but I just kept forgetting!  This is just a basic chocolate cake - do not use the Nigella recipe, I personally find her cakes quite dry - use the recipe I use which is on the previous blog. 

To make the cupcakes and the butter cream I used dark chocolate which I then melted.  I find that using proper chocolate keeps the texture quite moist, unlike cocoa powder.  So, for the butter cream I used a standard recipe but with 50g less butter, I replaced that with 150g of dark chocolate that I then melted and added to the mixture.  After this has been added and whisked in add a tbsp of peppermint flavouring.

This is the flavouring I used for this recipe because it does not have as many preservatives or strange chemicals in it as Dr.Oetker.  Please do not mix this flavouring with Betty Crocker ready-made butter cream, it will not taste nice at all.  Cutting corners with baking may sometimes seem like a good idea but honestly if you want great tasting and great looking food with as few preservatives, E-numbers etc in as possible then bake from scratch.