I have been experimenting with flavour essences for cupcakes as well as food colours, creating some pretty heady colours as well as flavours! I have created these for various young tasters but older tasters seem to like them too!
Raspberry, passionfruit and lime are flavourful and vibrant. The raspberry cakes are the most successful, I think. The lime cakes taste a little artificial.
The recipe is Nigella’s standard cupcake recipe, which I use a lot, as it’s an “everything in the food processor” recipe. The frosting is buttercream. Adding flavoured fondant creme is not strictly necessary, but adds more depth.
Ingredients
Cupcakes
125g self-raising flour
125g caster sugar
125g butter
2 large free-range eggs
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 tblsp milk
A couple of drops of red, yellow or green food colouring
Buttercream Icing
125g butter, softened
250g icing sugar, sifted
A couple of drops of raspberry, passionfruit or lime essence
A couple of drops of red, yellow or green food colouring
Method
Cupcakes
Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C and line a muffin tin with cupcake cases.
Put all the ingredients except the milk and food colouring in a food processor and blitz till smooth. Add the milk while pulsing to make a soft, dropping consistency.
Divide the mixture into 3 bowls and beat in food colouring to each bowl.
Spoon mixture into the cases, filling the cases equally.
Place the tin in the oven and bake for 12-15 minutes or until the cup cakes are cooked and golden on top.
Take the cup cakes in their cases out of the tin and cool on a wire rack.
Ice with the buttercream icing.
Buttercream Icing
In the food processor, cream together the butter and icing sugar until light an fluffy, then add flavour essence, food colour and fondant if using, whizzing continuously.
The Quirk and the Cool 