It's official, I've been bitten by the baking bug again! I've been browsing on Pinterest and pinning things like a mad woman to make at sometime in the future - it's a long list at this stage! I came across some unicorn cupcakes and thought they looked amazing, but as always I wanted to put my own spin on them, making my own Unicorn & Mermaid Cupcakes. These cupcakes are a swirl of colours with a five colour sponge and five colour icing on top too with a hidden surprise in the middle.
They're called Unicorn & Mermaid Cupcakes because half the swirls came out light and pretty like unicorns and the others came out in a mixture of colours which reminded me of mermaids - it really is as simple as that! Plus, who doesn't like unicorns and mermaids?! It's funny because they came out like this exactly half and half - just like magic! Plus the swirls are like the swirls of the sea and the swirls of a unicorn horn - okay now I really am thinking about this too much!
To make these glittering, magical, rainbow inspired cupcakes of gorgeousness you will need -
282g self raising flour
113g of softened butter
2 egg whites
2 eggs
1/2 tsp of salt
1/4 tsp baking soda
1 tsp vanilla extract
Nerds - Rainbow drops would be amazing too!
Any food colours you want, I used pink, blue, violet, leaf green and golden yellow.
Edible glitter, I used gold and pink for the unicorn cupcakes and silver and blue for the mermaid cupcakes.
Gold and silver ball sprinkles.
How to make these colourful, swirly unicorn & mermaid cupcakes -
1. Preheat oven to 200 degrees and line cupcake tins with cases, this recipe makes 16 cupcakes.
2. Sieve the flour, baking soda and salt into a bowl.
3. Cream the butter and sugar together in another bowl, an electric mixer would have been so handy for this but as I don't have one I had to use my hands and then a spoon to mix it all together.
4. Add the vanilla extract to the butter and sugar mixture.
5. Add the egg whites to the butter, sugar and vanilla mixture one at a time, beating with a whisk.
6. Add in the eggs to this mixture one at a time, beat again.
7. Gradually add the flour mixture and buttermilk to the butter, sugar, egg and vanilla mixture, alternating the two as you add to get the best texture from your batter.
8. Divide your batter into five bowls (or however many bowls of colours you want).
9. Add in a tiny drop of each food colouring if you want a pastel look and a bit more if you want a more vivid look that I went for with the sponge.
10. Spoon your batter into the cupcake cases, adding each colour where you want it in the case. I put pink on the bottom, purple and blue on the sides and then green and yellow on top of each other and I love how they turned out.
11. When fully baked (around 20 minutes later) leave your cupcakes to cool on a wire rack. Top tip: Cover with a tea-towel to keep your cupcakes moist.
12. When completely cool use a cupcake scooper (I have just invested in one of these!) and fill the hole with the Nerds, Rainbow Drops or whatever other sweets you'd like. (Try to resist eating the Nerds, I couldn't!).
For the delicious, creamy, swirly icing -
227g of unsalted, softened butter
404g of icing sugar
4 tbls of double cream
The food colourings you used for the sponge
1. Cream the butter until it's light and fluffy in texture.
2. Add the icing sugar and continue to beat the mixture until it becomes creamy in texture.
3. Add in the double cream and continue to beat.
4. Place your icing into five bowls.
5. Add the tiniest hint of food colouring (I wanted my icing to be pastel coloured so I used the smallest drop I could).
6. Add a spoon of each colour icing to a piping bag and push down with a spoon.
7. Ice your cupcakes in swirly, pastel coloured loveliness.
8. Sprinkle generously with glitter (or magic unicorn dust as I told my toddler it was!).
9. Add a gold and silver ball to the top of the cupcakes. I added the gold to my lighter/unicorn cupcakes and the silver to the blue/green/purple/mermaid cupcakes.
These were most definitely the yummiest cupcakes I've made and tasted in ages. The sponge was perfect, the icing was just right and creamy and the Nerds really do give the best addition to the taste. I need to make more magical food, it really is the most amazing you could eat and the various colours just add to the illusion of magic.