What do you do when you have a four day weekend with an abundance of Easter chocolate and some manky old bananas? Well, you make banana and white chocolate cupcakes of course!
These are my two favourite baking ingredients combined into one seriously naughty sweet treat. Sorry diet, but this weekend you are being put on hold!
(This recipe has been adapted from one of my favourite baking books 'Cupcakes from the Primrose Bakery'.)
(Makes 12)
125 g unsalted butter (at room temperature)
250 g caster sugar
250 g plain flour
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 tsp baking powder
4 (ripe) bananas , mashed with a fork
For the buttercream:
110 g unsalted butter (at room temperature)
60 ml milk
1 tsp vanilla extract
500 g icing sugar
100 g white chocolate, broken into pieces
3 tbps double cream
chopped up walnut halves
1.// Preheat oven to 160oc (fan)/180oc/350oF/gas mark 4 and plonk some cupcake cases into a 12-hole muffin tray.
2.// Cream together butter and sugar for a few minutes until pale and smooth with an electric whisk.
3.// Add eggs and vanilla extract and beat until well combined.
4.// Sift over flour and baking powder and whisk again.
5.// Stir in mashed bananas with a wooden spoon. (You could also add in white chocolate chunks at this point too - I didn't think of this at the time, but omgz that would be ah-mah-zing! Melted chocolate chunks...*drools*.)
6.// Add mixture into cupcake cases. They should be two-thirds full to get the perfect domed rise.
7.// Bung these bad boys into the oven for roughly 25 minutes and go put on an episode of 2 Broke Girls to keep your mind off the gorgeous smell wafting out of the kitchen.
8.// Check the cakes at around 20 minutes. If they are golden on top and a cake skewer/cocktail stick/sharp knife comes out clean then take them out and leave to cool in the tray for about 10 minutes..or 5 if you like them hot out the oven and simply can't wait any longer. If they aren't quite done yet, hang around and keep checking them with your skewers. Try not to open the over too much though, you want the inside temperature to remain as consistent as possible.
9.// After cooling in their tray, transfer to a wire cooling rack to let them fully cool down.
10.// Whilst waiting, whip up a batch of your white chocolate buttercream (the best part!).
11.// Stick you broken bits of white chocolate into the microwave for a minute or two until fully melted. After 45 seconds give it a stir and then keep checking every 15 seconds after this until fully melted (you don't want to burn the chocolate (it is irretrievable after this point)).
12.// Let the melted chocolate cool whilst you then beat together the butter, milk, vanilla extract and icing sugar for a few minutes until creamy and smoooooooth.
13.// Add chocolate and cream and whisk together again until well combined.
14.// Grab a small palette knife and scoop a heap of buttercream on top of the completely cooled cupcake. Smooth it around the edge and then swirl out the center to give a beautifully iced effect. Quickly sprinkle on the chopped walnuts before the icing sets.
15.// Take the biggest bite possible and admire your hard work!
Enjoy!
Helena xx
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