Valentine’s Surprise Cupcakes

Stuck for a present for a loved one on Valentine’s Day? Why not bake a special cupcake for your special someone!

For the icing:

• White fondant
• Food colouring (I used pink and red)
• Small heart cutter
• Rolling pin
• Cocktail stick

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Let’s get straight into the making! The first thing we want to start with is the icing heart decorations because we need to give them time to dry out a bit before we use them.

An easy way to make these is to buy already made pink and red fondant icing but as I didn’t have any, I improvised. If you’re like me, separate two bits of plain white fondant icing and roll them into small balls. Using a cocktail stick add a little bit of colouring to the middle of the ball (I have used gel icing colours).

Using your hands, fold the colouring into the icing by kneading it gently. Keep folding until the colour is smooth and the same shade is running through all of the icing.

Now take your rolling pin and roll out the icing until it is about half the thickness of a pound coin.

Time to cut out the hearts! I have used a small heart shaped cookie cutter for this part. Once we have cut out all of the little hearts, we can put these off to the side!

~ An additional step is to add just a little bit of edible glitter to the hearts for added decoration! ~

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The Surprise Part!

What you’ll need for the surprise hearts:

• 50g soft margarine
• 50g caster sugar
• 50g self-raising flour
• 1 egg
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

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~ Makes about 15 heart cakes ~

To get the heart shaped cake I will be using a cake pop mould. I have used this particular mould before in a previous blog post – Ghost Cake Pops.

Pre-heat your oven to 200˚C. Add all the ingredients into a bowl (or a big ceramic jug like mine) and mix them until they’re all combined and smooth.

Add a couple of drops of pink food colouring to the mixture and mix together. I used a cocktail stick to drop the food colouring in because when it gets on your hands, it doesn’t want to come off!

Fill your cake pop mould with the pink cake mixture, fill right to the top and level it off.

Place the top of the mold on and place the whole thing onto a baking tray (just to make it easier to get it in and out of the oven).

In my oven, the heart cakes took about 12 minutes to cook but yours might not need as long. Just check on them by carefully lifting up one corner of the mould to see the colouring of the hearts and if they have started to darken around the edges, they’re done!

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The Cupcake Part!

Ingredients for the cupcakes:

• 100g caster sugar
• 100g soft margarine
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 large eggs
• 100g self-raising flour
• 1 tsp baking powder

~ Makes about 8 large cupcakes ~

Pre-heat your oven to 200˚C. Firstly mix together the caster sugar, soft margarine and vanilla extract in a bowl until smooth.

Now add in the eggs one at a time, stirring well after each one.

Finally add in the flour and mix until there are no lumps and it’s all combined!

Fill a muffin tin with cupcake cases and put about a tablespoon of mixture in the bottom of some of the cases and spread it out.

Pop one of the pink heart cakes into the centre of each of the cupcake cases and press it down into the cream vanilla cake mixture.

With the rest of the cream mixture, cover over the hearts until the pink cannot be seen.

Bake them for 15-20 minutes or until they are golden on top. Once baked, leave to the side to cool.

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The Buttercream!

What you’ll need:

• 120g soft margarine
• 240g icing sugar
• 2 tbsp milk
• Pink gel icing colouring
• Piping bag

Place all of the soft margarine and icing sugar into a big mixing bowl. I like to start mixing them together first with a hand whisk which helps to stop the icing sugar from going everywhere!

Then, using an electric whisk, make sure there are no lumps and add in the milk to make the buttercream even creamier!

Separate the buttercream into two halves. One will stay cream and into the other we will add in pink food colouring.

The piping bag I’m using has two different compartments so you can pipe with two colours. If you don’t have any of these piping bags, just use a normal piping bag and put the pink down one side and the cream down the other. Now snip off the end of the piping bag and we’re ready to pipe.

Today I’ll just be piping spirals onto my cupcakes. To get this shape, just move the piping bag in a circular spiral shape whilst gently squeezing the bag. Repeat this for the rest of your cupcakes!

And there you have it! Just add your pink and red hearts to the buttercream and you’re finished!

I hope you have enjoyed making these Valentine’s Surprise Cupcakes! If you have a go don’t forget to share your makes with us on Instagram @aboxofbuttons or on Twitter @aBoxofButtons! See you next time!