10/03/2023
Strawberry cupcake🍓🍓
-Strawberry cupcakes are a delightful and fruity twist on traditional cupcakes. They're made with fresh strawberries, which give them a natural sweetness and a vibrant pink color.
Ingredients:
100g salted butter, softened
100g golden caster sugar
2 eggs, room temperature
100g self-raising flour
¼ tsp vanilla bean paste or vanilla extract
½ tsp baking powder
100g strawberries, hulled and finely chopped, plus six, halved, to decorate
a splash (if needed) whole milk
ICING:
3 tbsp freeze-dried strawberries
150g butter, softened
250g icing sugar
a splash (if needed) whole milk
Directions:
-Heat the oven to 180C/fan 160C/gas 4 and line a 12-hole cupcake tin with paper cases. Beat the butter and caster sugar in a large bowl using electric beaters for a couple of minutes or until it turns pale and fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time, along with 1 tbsp of the flour with each egg, and beat for 1 minute between each addition. Beat in the vanilla.
-Tip in half of the remaining flour with the baking powder and a pinch of salt. Use a large metal spoon to gently fold it in, being careful not to knock out any air. Fold in the remaining flour and the chopped strawberries. The mixture should drop off the spoon easily – if not, add 1 tbsp of milk and gently fold again. Divide the mixture equally between the cases and bake for 10-12 minutes or until risen, golden and a skewer poked into the centres comes out clean. Put on a wire rack to cool completely.
-Put the freeze-dried strawberries in a blender and whizz to a rough powder. Whizz the butter using an electric whisk until light and fluffy, then add the icing sugar, a spoonful at a time, whisking well between each addition. Stir in the strawberry powder and add a splash of milk if it’s a little thick. Spoon onto the cupcakes, or use a piping bag to pipe the icing onto each, then top each cupcake with a strawberry half. Will keep for two days in an airtight container (without the strawberry halves).
