Cup Cakes, Fairy Cakes and decorated muffins
I have seen many trends come and go in decorated cakes.
Over the last thirty years the traditional Royal icing has been largely replaced with sugar paste icing. Many tr
aditional techniques have been made simple and styles have changed to follow fashion.
Techniques that were introduced from the traditional makers decorators here in the UK were enhanced and improved on by cake decorators in Canada, Australsia and South Africa. Some techniques have fallen from favour and now look positively old fashioned.
Video’s once a rare commodity are now available on the internet and with this international design has either replaced or enhanced some of these traditional techniques.
On trend that is now so popular is the production of cup or fairy cakes. Many books are now available with hundreds of designs and simple techniques explained in detail.
It makes sense instead of labouring over the preparation of a fruit celebration cake making a simple sponge mixture takes but a few minutes. The flavours can include variations such as chocolate, fruit and nut and the decorations can be varied to include all sorts of themes.
Once made they can be boxed in singles, fours, sixes etc. or displayed on stands to replace the traditional celebration cake designs.
There are many recipes for simple sponge cake mixture – over the years I have used this following recipe – it works every time……
First you need to decide how many cakes you want to make and how large they need to be – there are at least three sizes – Large, Medium and Fairy size. A mixture using 1 medium egg will produce approximately 6 medium cup cakes.
This method is simple – first weigh your egg in its shell. If your using more than one no problem weigh how ever many you are using.
Then weigh the same weight in Self Raising Flour, Caster Sugar (or Golden Caster Sugar) and approximately a level teaspoon off baking powder per four eggs. Sieve the flour sugar and baking powder into a bowl and pour into a food processor. Beat the eggs in a bowl with your vanilla extract. Pour this into the processor with your Margarine (same weigh as the eggs). Pulse just two or three times. Then turn onto high speed for no more than three to four seconds. It should be just mixed – don’t over mix otherwise the cakes will not rise.
Spoon into the baking cases about two thirds full. Bake at between 160 to 170 for between 15 to 20 mins.
Remove from oven and cool. Simple.
Variations:
Add chocolate flavour add coco but take out the same amount of flour – you can also add other flavours such as Walnut, Pistachio, Banana, Cinnamon etc.
Cases, Cup Boxes, Cake Pods, Icing Tubes, Sprinkles, Cup Cake Stands are available from Items in all sizes.
Many different colours are available Silver, Gold, Plain, Red, Blue, Spots, Christmas etc.
Also you can colour the icing or add many different type of sprinkles – even design faces or theme in some other way.