Today, I had an actual excuse, as I was making them as practice for my cousin's Hen's Night coming up in a month or two.
When I say "make cupcakes" what I really mean is... experiment with cupcakes.
I made 2 batches of batter from a recipe I adapted. Many people find the taste and texture of cupcakes is not a good as you would expect based on the pretty appearance, so I eventually came up with a moist, light recipe that tastes good. (Even Big C loves them, and he's definitely not a cupcake man!)
The batter was looking suspiciously goopey, but it turned out fine after cooking.
The first icing I tried was a simple glaze, made of little more than icing sugar and water:
I don't know what it's officially called, but I whipped up some egg white and made a new, thicker glaze with that (plus icing sugar). It needs a squirt of lemon or lime juice to counteract the sickly-sweetness, but the effect is cute!
I like how it's thick enough to stop the chocolate showing through, but still wet enough to spread itself out into a smooth shiny glaze. It's so sweet that just a tiny blob of icing in the middle is enough anyway.
Next up, I took the egg white mixture and pummeled it with some cocoa...
I love the shiny, rich look! However I found that taste a little too sweet. Next time, I'll use real chocolate and maybe make a ganache with cream, then pipe it on. That way you get the full chocolate flavour and creaminess, rather than just sweetness.
The icing was so pale pink it barely photographed, but I love it against the dark cupcake, especially with a piece of broken dark chocolate on top. (It was partly inspired by Sweetapolita's rosewater frosting chiffon cake. She is amazing!) Cupcakes in this colour would work perfectly with the Hen's Night colour scheme - and they would probably have black and white wrappers.
- Amyshka
They look to pretty to eat! Although I bet they were delicious. How fun!!
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