Easter basket cupcakes recipe

These Easter basket cupcakes are the ideal treat for Easter to give as a gift or share with your family and friends.

Impress your friends and family with these special Easter basket cupcakes. The basket is easy to make using ready-to-roll icing. It’s best to make this the day before so it has time to firm and set in place. Mini Eggs make a great decorative treat too and are easy to find in most supermarkets. It will take around 1hr to make and assemble the decorations for this cupcake recipe. A soft, moist vanilla sponge is hiding underneath these impressive baskets of goodies and the sweet green vanilla flavoured buttercream adds to the delicious taste of these Easter cakes.

Ingredients

For this Easter recipe you will need:

• 150g self-raising flour
• 150g softened butter
• 150g golden caster sugar
• 3 medium eggs
• 1tsp vanilla extract
• 3tbsp milk, room temperature

For the buttercream:

• 200g unsalted butter (room temperature)
• 400g icing sugar
• 1tsp vanilla extract
• 3tbsp milk
• Green food colour

For the toppers:

• Assortment of chocolate eggs
• 250g ready to roll white fondant
• 1tsp on tylose powder/gum tragacanth (optional but make the basket handle firmer)

You will also need:

• Deep muffin pan with 12 cupcake cases
• Small flower cutters
• 24 cocktail sticks
• Grass piping nozzle and piping bag (optional)

Method

1. For the toppers:
   1. The day before you want to make the cupcakes you will need to make the handles so they set.
   2. Add the tylose, if using, to the fondant and knead for 5 minutes. Take 20g of fondant and cut it in half. Roll 2 long thin sausage shapes and then wrap them around each other to get a rope effect. Bend into an arch shape and stick a cocktail stick in the bottom of each end about half way. Repeat until you have 12 handles, leaving them to air-dry overnight. Do not put in an airtight container.
     For the cakes:  
   1. To make this cupcake recipe, preheat the oven to 160°C/375°F/Gas Mark 3 and line your baking tray.
   2. Add all the ingredients into a large bowl and beat until smooth. Don’t overbeat or the cakes will be greasy.
   3. Fill the cases with an ice cream scoop of mixture and bake for 25 minutes.
   4. Remove from the oven and cool in the tins for 10 minutes before moving to a wire rack
     For the buttercream:  
   1. Add all the ingredients into a large bowl and beat until smooth, about 8 minutes with an electric hand whisk.
     For the toppers:  
   1. Add the grass nozzle (if using) to your piping bag and add the green icing. Pipe grass on the tops of all the cooled cupcakes. To pipe the grass, apply pressure and lift up slightly, release the pressure and pull away quickly.
   2. Using 10g of fondant, divide into 3 and colour as you wish. Use a blossom cutter and a daisy cutter to make the flowers. Roll small balls of yellow fondant for the centres.
   3. Decorate with Mini eggs and flowers then push the set handles into the cupcake.

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