Santa's coming cupcakes recipe

These Santa’s coming cupcakes, made by our cupcake baking and decorating queen Victoria Threader, are simple to make at home with our easy recipe. The toppers are made using coloured fondant and colourful sprinkles. Prepare your toppers in advance so the fondant can set so it’ll sit better on the buttercream when assembling the cupcakes. When baking the cupcakes make sure you don’t open the oven door whilst they’re cooking, otherwise they may sink in the middle. If this happens, just add a little more buttercream on top of the cake to level it out before applying the Santa topper.

Ingredients

For the cakes:

• 75g caster sugar
• 75g butter
• 75g self-raising flour
• 2 medium eggs
• 15ml milk
• 1tsp vanilla extract

For the buttercream:

• 55g butter
• 250g icing sugar

½

• tsp vanilla extract
• 30ml milk

For the toppers:

• 310g ready to roll white fondant
• Red, black, chestnut and yellow food colour
• Brick embosser
• Rainbow confetti sprinkles
• Gum tragacanth (optional)

You will also need:

• 68mm circle cutter
• Piping bag with Wilton 6b nozzle (optional)
• Sharp knife
• Soft brush
• Edible glue
• Jigsaw cutter for the boots (optional)

Method

1. 1. Preheat your oven to 160°C/325°F/Gas Mark 3. Line your baking tray with 6 cases.
   2. Beat the sugar and butter with the vanilla essence until light and fluffy.
   3. Add 1 egg, 1 third of the flour and a splash of milk and beat until just combined and repeat until all the ingredients is combined.
   4. Add the mixture to your cakes and bake in the oven for 20 mins depending on your oven, remove and cool in the tray for 10 mins before cooling on a wire rack.

   For the buttercream:
   

   1. Make the buttercream by adding all the ingredients together and beating for 5 minutes on a medium speed.

   For the toppers:
   

   1. The night before you want to make these toppers, add 1tsp of gum tragacanth (if using) to the fondant, knead and leave in an airtight bag and container over night
   2. Colour 150g of white fondant yellow and cut 6x 68mm circles for the background to the fireplace.
   3. For the brick: colour 100g brown, roll to 1/8 inch thick and emboss using the brick embosser. Cut 6x 68mm circles and, using a sharp knife, cute a square out for the fireplace. Stick the brick fondant to the yellow backgrounds with a light brush of water.
   4. For the legs: colour 20g of fondant red. Roll and cut 12x little rectangles for the tops of the legs, then stick these to the top (inside) of the fireplace. Rollling 20g of white, repeat as you did with the red, sticking the white rectangles under the red.
   5. For the boots: colour 20g of fondant black, roll and cut 12x boot shapes out. We used a jigsaw cutter but you can do it by hand if you don’t have one. Once cut, stick with a brush of water under the white rectangles so it looks like Santa’s feet are dangling down from the chimney
      
   6. To create a decorated mantle, we brushed the top of the brick with some glue (make some by melting a touch of fondant in the microwave with a few drops of water) and then dipped it into the rainbow sprinkles. You can move them into place once they have stuck.
      
   7. It helps if you leave these toppers to dry for a while, as it will stop them drooping.
   8. When the cakes are cool, pipe a swirl of buttercream with the piping bag and nozzle or spread a layer with a palette knife and place the topper on top.