I do love making cupcakes, especially when I experiment with the frosting. These ones were made for my news production peeps and my friend Sam commissioned me to make them for her boyfriend.

Baking is my way of spreading the love. These ones were made with luff and cuddles.

Cupcakes are so easy to make, but the tricky-ness can come when making the icing for the cupcakes. I hope to experiment more with different toppings when I have more time (i.e. when uni is finished in 3 weeks – EEK!)

But the easiest type of frosting to make for cupcakes is butter cream – all you need to do is whip the shit out of the butter then add some icing sugar and then keep whipping. Then once you’ve whipped it a lot, you add whatever flavouring you like. These ones I just added cocoa, to add a rich chocolate flavour. I may attempt a ganaché at some point, where you use melted chocolate instead of cocoa.

Basic Vanilla Buttercake

Ingredients

90g butter, softened

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/2 cup (110g) caster sugar

2 eggs

1 cup (150g) self-raising flour

2 tablespoons of milk

Method

1. Prehead oven to 180°C/160°C fan-forced. Line a 12-hole standard muffin pan with paper cases.

2. Beat butter, extract, sugar, eggs, four, and milk in a small bowl with electric mixer on low speed until ingredients are just combined. Increase speed to medium, beat until mixture is changed to a paler colour.

3. Divide mixture among cases; smooth surface.

4. Bake for about 20 minutes. Turn cakes onto a wire rack to cool.

Butter cream frosting

125g butter, softened

1 1/2 cups (240g) icing sugar

2 tablespoons milk

4 tablespoons cocoa powder

Beat butter in a small bowl with electric mixer until light and fluffy; beat in sifted icing sugar and milk, in two batches. Add cocoa powder and stir in.

Using a  knife spread butter cream frosting onto cupcakes.

Tips

When baking the cupcakes keep an eye on them and test them by poking them with your finger. When they spring back, they are cooked.

Make sure when you are making the butter cream frosting that you whip it for a long time, you should notice the butter becoming a paler colour. By whipping it a lot it makes it a lot creamier and the icing sugar starts to blend more with the butter. You shouldn’t be able to tell that there is sugar in the frosting, if it has been beaten enough.

Other frosting ideas

Food colourings

Chopped chocolate – a block of Black Forest is good, but you can try anything – Rocky Road, macadamia nut or just plain chocolate.

Leaving the butter cream frosting plain and sprinkling with shaved chocolate or almonds or other types of nuts or you could decorate with silver balls sprinkled on top or 100s and 1000s etc.

Using M&Ms to decorate the top of the cupcakes, once frosting is on or mix the M&Ms in the frosting then decorate cupcakes.

Oreos chopped up in the icing, or the cupcakes or just added on top – gives a cookies and cream flavouring.

If you can’t be bothered making your own frosting, you can buy icing in a can – IT IS THE BEST THING SINCE SLICED BREAD. You can buy it from Milly’s cake shop in Auckland.

Crude cupcakes. Basic butter creme frosting with some pink food colouring and silver baubles spelling out crude words for teh lols.

An entire block of black forest chocolate chopped up into a basic butter creme frosting.

Black icing in a can with M&Ms and Oreos for decoration.