Marble Cupcakes

As you might already know I absolutely love cupcakes and I thought It would be great to try and experiment a little. These white and milk chocolate marble cupcakes are a great way to impress people without putting too much effort in.

Ingredients for sponge:

110g self-raising flour

1 tsp baking powder

110g butter

2 large eggs

110g caster sugar

2-3 drops of vanilla essence

1 tbls of coco power

Preheat the oven to 180˚ C.  Line the wells of two cupcake tins with 24 paper cases.

In a mixing bowl sift the flour and baking powder holding the sieve high to give the flour a good airing. Then simply add the rest of the other ingredients to the bowl and whisk them, preferably with an electric whisk, until combined.

Now divide the mixture between two bowls, mixing the coco powder to one using an electric whisk until smooth and creamy.

Place a tablespoon of the plain cake mixture into the bottom of each cupcake case and then place a tablespoon of the chocolate mixture on top.  Take a skewer or cocktail stick and swirl the mixture briefly.

Place the cake tins in the oven and bake for 15-20 minutes.

Ingredients for icing:

110g unsalted butter (room temperature)

500g icing sugar, sifted

75g good-quality dark chocolate

75g good-quality white chocolate

Piping bag and nozzle

Melt the dark chocolate in a bowl in the microwave until smooth and thick.

Top Tip: (Heat at 30 second intervals stirring in between to avoid burning the chocolate)

Leave to cool. Do exactly the same to the white chocolate.

In a large mixing bowl beat the butter and half the icing sugar until smooth using an electric whisk. Gradually add the remainder of the icing sugar and beat again until the butter cream is smooth and creamy. Divide the butter cream icing into two separate bowls. Add the dark melted chocolate into one bowl and the white melted chocolate into the other and mix separately.

To pipe the icing, place a star nozzle in piping bag. Fill one side of the icing bag with the white chocolate icing and the other side with the dark chocolate icing; this will create the swirled effect.

Hold the bag vertically, twist and hold the end with one hand and rest the tip of the bag in the other hand. Pipe a ring of icing around the edge of the cupcake. Pipe a small spiral overlapping the ring, stop pressure when the tip is in the centre of the swirl, then push the bag down and draw up sharply to finish.