Banoffee Cupcakes

After being with my boyfriend for nearly a year, my love of baking all things pretty and cupcakey, has become the world's worst kept secret amongst his friends. So please, just for a moment, imagine my surprise when his muscly, tattoo-covered best friend let slip that he also has a love for all things pretty and cupcakey.
Following this bombshell, some entirely unsubtle hints were dropped about banoffee being his flavour of choice. This fact came conveniently to my attention the week before his birthday, and here we are...twelve baked banoffee cupcakes later...

These cupcakes are super sweet, with a subtle banana infusion. The sponge is much like banana bread, for which I used fresh, mashed bananas. The gluttonous buttercream is a heavenly mixture of butter and dulce de leche. 
All these gorgeous aspects make this a little banoffee cake, that captures a whole lot of perfect.

Makes twelve cakes

Method

For the sponge:

80g butter
280g caster sugar
240g plain flour
1 tbsp baking powder
240ml semi skimmed milk
2 tbsp vanilla essence
2 large eggs
2 ripe bananas, mashed

• Preheat your oven to 190ºC (Gas Mark 5) and prepare a 12-hole deep muffin tray with cases of your choice. 
• Place your butter, caster sugar, plain flour, baking powder, milk, vanilla essence and eggs into a mixing bowl and beat together until your mixture is smooth. 
• Then mash three ripe bananas, until they have the texture of a paste. 
• Mix your bananas into your preprepared cake mix.
• When well combined, spoon the mixture evenly between your cases. (TIP: only half fill your cake cases to ensure an even rise and no overspill.)
• Bake for 20 minutes. 
• Remove and leave to cool completely. 

For the buttercream:

500g icing sugar

160g butter

50ml semi skimmed milk

100g dulce de leche (or a toffee syrup of some sort, e.g. a toffee ice-cream sauce.)

• Beat all of your ingredients together until fluffy. 
• Frost your cupcakes however you wish.

For my decoration, I opted for various different cases and topped each one with a swirl of squirty cream, a slice of fresh banana and a sprinkle of grated milk chocolate. 

Using a variety of cases always makes me think of parties you attended when you were a young child, and when was a day spent in a soft-play area, followed by ice-cream/jelly and pretty cakes ever not fun? Never, precisely. 

So, enjoy these banoffee miniatures, they're more than a little bit wonderful.

Enjoy, K x

Fudgy, Caramelly Cupcakes

When you're with a man who appreciates your baking, his birthday is the perfect excuse to go a bit crazy with calories.
He dropped some not-so-subtle hints about liking caramel, so I ran with the idea and ended up with a fluffy caramel sponge, coated in a lightly salted caramel buttercream and topped it all off with a homemade fudge drizzle and crushed Daim bar. There's nothing like using a little artistic licence, is there?
My cake loving other half is an unashamed patriot, so I decided to place these cakes in both blue gingham cases and some which adorned Union Jacks. This is just a personal touch and you can, of course, dress these gorgeous little cakes as you wish.
After I made them I did have to taste them, just to ensure that they weren't poisonous...I'm a samaritan like that. They certainly weren't, the end result was a taste not too dissimilar to sticky toffee pudding, so if that's a favourite of yours, then this recipe should take a prominent position on your shelf.




                                                                                                    










(Recipe makes 16-20 cupcakes)

Method

For the caramel sauce:

250g golden caster sugar (if you don't have this, you can use normal caster sugar and just add a little light muscovado sugar to the mixture.)
135ml water

• Put the sugar into a heavy bottomed pan and mix with five tablespoons of your water over a low heat, until the sugar has dissolved. 
• Increase the heat for around 10 minutes, until your sugar has turned dark amber in colour. 
• Remove the pan from the heat and allow to cool slightly. You can stir the mixture occasionally to help it cool quicker. 
• Once the mixture has cooled slightly, add your remaining water. Take care as the mixture may spit and will be extremely hot. 
• When your sauce has completely cooled, pour into a bowl and cover, until ready to use. You can store this mixture for up to a week if necessary. 

For the sponge:

100g salted butter

120g light, soft brown sugar

120g dark, soft brown sugar

2 large eggs

1 tsp vanilla extract

125g self-raising flour, sifted

120g plain flour, sifted

75ml caramel sauce (recipe listed above)

50ml double cream

• Preheat your oven to 160ºC (Gas Mark 3) and place your chosen cupcake cases into muffin trays. 
• Beat all of your ingredients together until all elements are well combined and the mixture is fluffy. 
• Spoon the mixture into your prepared cupcake cases (attempt only fill them half fill so the baked mixture does not spill over the edge of your cases.) 
• Bake in the oven for around 25 minutes, or until your mixture is cooked through. 
• Remove and leave to cool completely before decorating.

For the buttercream:

80g salted butter

7 tbsp semi skimmed milk

250g light, soft brown sugar

260g icing sugar, sifted

1 tsp vanilla extract

A pinch of rock salt

• Melt your butter in a heavy saucepan, along with the brown sugar. Bring the mixture to the boil and boil for one minute. 
• Remove from the heat and stir in half of your icing sugar, before allowing it to cool slightly and adding the remaining icing sugar, rock salt and vanilla extract. Stir until the mixture thickens a little. 
• This icing is best used immediately.

For decoration: 

Fudge sauce:

340g granulated sugar

85g brown sugar

100g cocoa powder

30g plain flour

1/2 tsp salt

400g evaporated milk

250ml water

2 tbsp salted butter

2 tsp vanilla extract

•  Place the granulated and brown sugar, cocoa powder, flour and salt into a saucepan. Add the evaporated milk, water and butter and bring slowly to the boil, stirring constantly. Once boiling, cook for five minutes.
• Remove the sauce from the heat and allow to cool slightly. Stir in the vanilla extract.

Otherwise, simply crush your Daim bars and decorate as you wish. 

I hope these little cakes bring you as much happiness as they did one certain 24 year old man recently. I have every faith that they will.

Enjoy, K x

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