Twit Twooo Hooting Halloween Owls Halloween Cupcakes Muffins Recipes

OWL CUPCAKES

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Line 2 muffin tins with paper liners.
• Combine 2 cups sugar, flour, 1 cup cocoa powder, baking powder, salt, and baking soda in a bowl.
• Whisk buttermilk, vegetable oil, eggs, and vanilla extract in a large bowl. Add flour mixture; mix until well-combined. Pour in hot water; stir until batter is smooth. Divide batter evenly among muffin tins.
• Bake in the preheated oven until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, about 12 minutes. Transfer cupcakes to a wire rack and let cool completely, about 20 minutes.
• Whip 3/4 cup plus 1 1/2 tablespoon heavy cream in a bowl with an electric mixer until soft peaks form. Fold in 1 1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons mascarpone cheese, 7 tablespoons cocoa powder, and 1/4 cup sugar gently to make frosting.
• Spread 1 tablespoon frosting over each cooled cupcake.
• Twist chocolate sandwich cookies open, leaving all cream filling on 1 side. Place 2 cookies, cream filling-side up, on each cupcake to make owl eyes. Place a brown milk chocolate piece on each cookie to create pupils. Insert an orange or yellow milk chocolate piece in the center to make a beak.

SPOOKY SPIDER CUPCAKES/MUFFINS FOR A HOWLING HALLOWEEN!

Steps:

• Pre-heat the oven to 180C/360°F.
• This is a VERY easy all in one mix; simply put the softened butter into a large mixing bowl with the sugar, flour, cocoa, baking powder, beaten eggs and vanilla extract. Mix on slow with a hand mixer, incorporating all the dry ingredients gradually into the butter and eggs. Increase the speed to medium and then to high. Stop and add the milk, tablespoon-by-tablespoon, whisking in between each spoon until you have a smooth, silky mixture with no lumps. Add the chocolate chips or chocolate pieces and mix well.
• Spoon the mixture into well-greased muffin tins, or tins lined with muffin cases - I do not use cases as a rule!
• Bake in the pre-heated oven for 20 to 25 minutes, or until well risen - check with a wooden cocktail stick by pushing it in the middle of the cake, if it comes out clean, the cakes are ready.
• Leave to cool for 5 minutes and then gently run a knife around the sides to release the cakes - or take the cakes out if they are in muffin cases. Put them on a wire rack and allow to cool completely before decorating.
• Whilst the cakes are cooling, make the butter cream icing. Put the softened butter and icing sugar into a mixing bowl and mix thoroughly by hand with a fork. Add the vanilla extract and mix again before adding the cocoa powder - mix all the ingredients together and then add the milk if you need to loosen the mixture for spreading. The butter cream icing should be soft and silky - but should still hold its shape.
• When you are ready to decorate the spider cakes, cut the liquorice Catherine wheels into "legs" that just dangle over the edge of the cake - mine were about 2" in length. Take the liquorice allsorts sweets/candy that have a white inside and a liquorice exterior - see photos - gently make a hole in the centre with a cocktail stick and push in a small sliver of liquorice to make the eyes. Choose a red or orange liquorice allsorts sweet/candy, which is layered - see photo - and cut each sweet/candy into 4 pieces for the mouth.
• Gently push the legs into the top of the cake at intervals - the icing will go over the top to keep them in place later, so do not worry how they look! You need 8 legs per spider - of course! Spoon on some chocolate butter cream icing to cover the legs and come within 1/2" of the edge - make it look "hairy" by stippling with a fork. Then place two eyes in the top, finishing off with a mouth! Continue to decorate all the cakes in this way, place them all on a plate with some extra sweets/candy scattered around them, and watch the looks of delight on the children's faces when they see them!

FAIRY CAKES

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.
• Line a 12 cup muffin tin with baking cups.
• Put all the ingredients except for the milk into a food processor and blend until smooth. Pulse while adding the milk down the funnel to make for a soft consistency.
• It doesn't seem like enough, but you can get enough into each baking cup, just scrape it all out and try to fill each one equally.
• Bake for 15-20 minutes or until they are golden on top.
• Cool on a wire rack, but remove from the tin as soon as possible.
• Before you decorate, slice off any mounded tops so you have a flat surface to decorate. Icing: Mix the sugar, egg white and lemon juice in a small bowl until smooth and creamy, it should have the consistency of heavy cream I always break the batch into smaller batches so I can have different colors When my girlfriend made these for my shower, she frosted them with a bright pink icing, sprinkled them with iridescent edible glitter and topped it with an edible (gum paste) rosebud.
• Very very cute!
• In the cookbook they show them topped with rosebuds and little sugared daisies and fresh berries and they even made a spiderweb with black and white icing.
• Use your imagination, the flat tops give lots of room to be creative!

MAGICAL CHRISTMAS FAIRY CAKES - CHRISTMAS FAIRY CUPCAKES

Steps:

• Makes 24 mini cakes or 12 larger ones.
• For mini cakes you will need a 12 hole tartlet tin (these are 5cm at the rim and 1 1/2 cm deep) and you will need to use it twice, unless you have two. For larger cakes use a 12-hole bun or muffin tin (these are 6 1/2 cm at the rim and 2cm deep). You can use the little paper cases according to the size tin you have - I have suggested silver. If not, butter the base and sides of the holes before filling with the mixture.
• Preheat the oven to 190C/375F/Gas mark 5. Either butter the tin or place the paper cases in the holes (see above). In a mixing bowl beat the butter and sugar until pale and fluffy. You can use an electric whisk or a wooden spoon.
• Add the beaten egg, a little at a time, whisking to incorporate, then beat in the vanilla.
• Sift in half of the flour and fold into the mixture. Add the milk and the rest of the flour and fold until well combined.
• Spoon into the tin and bake for 12 minutes or until risen and golden on top. Allow to cool for ten minutes before removing from the tin. Cool the cakes on a cooling tray/rack.
• Mix a little water to the icing sugar until you have a soft glace icing - add a little vanilla extract if you wish, or other flavourings.
• Spoon the icing over the top of the cooled fairy cakes, allowing the icing to drip down into the cases or over the sides of the cakes.
• Roll out the fondant icing on a board with icing sugar sprinkled over to stop it sticking; press or cut your festive shapes and place one on top of each iced fairy cake. Sprinkle over the edible glitter or sparkles and arrange the fairy cakes on an attractive serving plate.