Saturday, January 26, 2008

Cappuccino Cupcakes



These little mouthfuls of joy are from Nigella's Domestic Goddess and are SO easy.They are a coffee sponge cake with a white chocolate icing and a dusting of cocoa powder. You just throw everything into a food processor and then drop the mixture into the cupcake tray and bake for 20 minutes. I also love them, because I love things with a coffee flavour, and don't they just look like little mini cappuccinos?


Cupcakes:

3/4 cup self-rising cake flour
1/2 cup soft unsalted butter (1 stick)
7 tablespoons of sugar (I actually used 8 after testing the batter)
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 heaped tablespoon instant espresso
2-3 tablespoons milk (I used 3 for the right consistency)

Icing

5 1/2 Ounces white chocolate (Bakers brand is really good)
1/4 cup butter (1/2 stick)
1/2 cup plus 1 tablespoon sour cream
1 2/3 cups confections sugar, sifted scant teaspoon cocoa powder**

** just means slightly less than a teaspoon.

Preheat oven to 400F

Put all the cupcake ingredients except for the milk into the food processor and blitz to combine. Pulse again, adding milk down the funnel to form a batter with a soft dropping consistency. Spoon into the baking cups in their pan and then cook for about 20 minutes. When done, leave in the pan to cool for 5 minutes before turning out on to a wire rack.


When the cupcakes are completely cold, make the icing. Melt the chocolate ad butter in the microwave or a double boiler, and after it cooled a little, stir in the sour cream. Gradually bet in the sifted confections' sugar. If the consistency isn't right or the icing, add either hot water to thin or more sifted sugar to thicken. spread roughly and generously over the top of each cupcake, and then dust sparingly with cocoa, but pressing a little through a small sieve, so that they look like little cups of cappuccino.

Makes 12.

13 comments:

Marc Shapiro said...

I liked the white chocolate icing the best ... very smooth and creamy!

JEP said...

That cupcake photo is just begging to have a bite taken...looks sooo delicious!

Anonymous said...

That icing looks positively sinful! I adore Nigella. She has the best recipes. Gorgeous photo!

Anonymous said...

I confess...I ate all of the icing first. Bill was more civilized and ate the icing with the cake. Thumbs up from both of us.

Stef said...

Those look scrumptious! mmmm

Unknown said...

Can you email several of those brownies our way? They look amazing.

Unknown said...

oops, I meant cupcakes....

Anonymous said...

Oh your icing is just oozing with sexiness. Geez, they look just the cover of the book. BTW- your curry chicken looks great too. We love curry and it's comfort for us.

Anonymous said...

We loved the cupcakes! What a delicious treat.

Anonymous said...

wow i was expecting wonderful cupcakes. instead i ended up with rather short sized ones and an extremely sweet icing which was also too runny to be called an icing...

Cathie said...

I'm sorry they didn't turn out as well as you expected! The icing should definitely harden up within 30 mins as the chocolate sets and become quite firm.

Anonymous said...

i just made these cupcakes last week! they were so yummy! i hope you don't mind, i linked it to my page!

Cathie said...

I don't mind at all -Glad you liked them!!!