Christmas Cupcakes (For about 12 large cupcakes)
For the cupcakes
1 sachet of 400g of "Moirs" cake mix in Vanilla Flavour (refer photo step 1)
100g of chocolate chips (refer photo step 2)
125g of Almond powder (refer photo step 2)
100g of melted Margarine (Leave in the microwave on high for 30 seconds)
175ml of milk
10ml of Vanilla essence
12 Cupcake liners (5cm diameter at base/4cm height) - I purchased mine here
For the decoration
Any Christmas mini chocolates of your choice (about 12 pieces)
Sugar pearls/ sprinkles (normally in the Pastry section in Supermarkets or on Ebay)
*Fondant/ Sugar paste of your prefered colors (about 150g)
20g-30g of corn flour for dusting
Note: For the Fondant/ Sugar paste, you can purchase it ready-made like I did at Intermart Ebene (Refer photo step 8).
Procedure
Step 1: Get your Vanilla Cake Mix, your Almond powder and chocolate chips ready !
Step 2: Place them (Vanilla Cake Mix, Almond powder and chocolate chips) in a bowl and using a hand whisk, mix them all together.
Step 3: Melt your margarine in the microwave (30 seconds on high) and add it to your dry mixture from step 2. Eventually add your vanilla essence to your milk and add the resulting mixture as well.
Step 4: Still using your hand whisk, mix mix mix !
Step 5: As soon as the mixture color is uniform and that your hand whisk leaves some "trails", stop mixing, your cake batter is ready ! (Do not overmix...)
Step 6: Get your cupcake liners ready in your cupcake mold and fill them with your cake batter. The cupcake liners should be filled at 75% not at 100% so that they will have some space when the batter will rise in the oven ... Eventually bake in a preheated oven at 175 Degrees Celsius for 25-30 minutes or until golden brown. To test whether your cupcakes are done, you can also insert a toothpick in the middle of one cupcake, if it comes out clean/dry, then your cupcakes are done !
Note: Do not forget to use a cupcake mold like I mentioned above to ensure that your cupcakes retain a nice shape ..
Step 7: Cupcakes out of the oven, hmmmmmm !... Remove them from the cupcake mold and allow them to cool completely before starting decoration (step 8).
Step 8: Get your sugar paste (also called fondant) ready!... (I purchased mine at Intermart Ebene)
Step 9: Using your rolling pin, flatten your sugar paste to a thinkness of about 2mm and using your favourite circular cookie cutter (should be slightly larger than your cupcake top diameter), cut some circular shapes !... Eventually add a small amount of water on your cupcake surface and position your circularly cut sugar paste. The water will actually moisten the sugar paste and make the latter sticky and thus stick to the surface. Then just let your creativity explode !... Add sugar pearls and/or sprinkles, chocolates etc... As usual, use a little amount of water on the fondant to make it become sticky so that your decorations may stand in place ..
Tip: Do not forget to use some corn flour if you find your sugar paste a bit sticky ..
Step 10: Your cupcakes are ready !... (Check the link below for the recipe of Christmas cookies )
Step 11: Wrap your cupcakes in Cellophane paper, add small tags and other decorations and voila !...
THANK YOU FOR WATCHING !...
