Caramel Apple Cupcakes

These pay homage to the caramel apple. A moist soft cake with apple bits, smothered in a home-made caramel icing and topped with chopped walnuts. All it needs is a lolly stick down the middle to complete the effect!

• 70g all-purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 30g unsalted butter, softened
• 100g sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 2 apples, peeled and finely chopped

Preheat oven to 180C and line one 6-muffin tin with paper liners.

Whisk together flour, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt in a medium bowl and set aside. Beat butter and sugar with an electric mixer until pale and fluffy, about 5 minutes. Beat in eggs and vanilla until well mixed, then reduce speed to low to mix in apples. Finally, add flour mixture and continue beating, scraping down sides of bowl.

Fill cups till half full and bake for 18 - 20 minutes. Remove cupcakes from tins and transfer to a wire rack to cool completely while you make the caramel frosting.

• 225g light brown sugar
• 1/2 cup heavy whipping cream
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 55g butter
• 1/8 cup chopped walnuts or pecans

In a saucepan, bring the sugar and cream to a boil and boil for one minute. Add baking soda, and boil one more minute. Remove from heat and add butter, but do not stir yet.

Let the mixture cool, then beat well. Spoon into a piping bag with a round tip and let chill in the fridge until it's thick enough to pipe.

Pipe a swirl of frosting on each cupcake, then sprinkle some chopped walnuts over.

Lavender Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting

Lavender sugar is simply plain caster sugar infused with the scent of dried lavender. To make it, place a 2 - 3 tablespoons of dried lavender into a cotton sachet in an airtight jar and pour sugar over it. Let the scent infuse for a week and you're good to go.

The scent and flavour is subtle, so I find a simple cream cheese frosting goes well with it.

For the cupcakes:

• 60g unsalted butter, softened at room temperature
• 65g lavender sugar
• 2 eggs
• 100g plain flour
• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/8 teaspoon salt

Preheat oven to 190C and line 6 muffin cups with paper liners.

In a bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Using an electric mixer, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the flour mixture and beat till combine. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating until smooth.

Fill each cup till 3/4 full and bake for about 16-20 minutes. A skewer inserted into a cupcake should come out clean. Let the cupcakes cool completely while you make the icing.

• 115g icing sugar, sifted
• 100g cream cheese, softened at room temperature
• 1/2 teaspoon pure lemon oil
• 2 drops violet food colouring

In an electric mixer, beat the cream cheese till smooth, then add the icing sugar and continue beating. Add the food colouring and lemon essence and beat until combined.

Pipe a swirl of frosting on each cooled cupcake, decorate with some pretty sprinkles of your choice and shove into face. Yum.

Melting Chocolate Cupcakes with Raspberry Cream Cheese Frosting

Just because I love chocolate. Just because I love raspberries. Just because I love cream cheese. Just because I bought a huge bag of Valhorna chocolate. Just because this is what I feel like eating right now.

I just want to make some really girly and pretty, then demolish it with a man-sized bite.

• 25g dutch-processed cocoa powder
• 120 ml boiling hot water
• 80g plain flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 60g unsalted butter, room temperature
• 100g caster sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 6 teaspoons chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 190C and line 6 muffin cups with paper liners.

In a small bowl stir until smooth the boiling hot water and the cocoa powder. Let cool to room temperature. In another bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt.

Using an electric mixer, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating until smooth. Beat in the vanilla extract. Add the flour mixture and beat only until incorporated. Then add the cooled cocoa mixture and stir until smooth.

Fill each cup halfway, then add a teaspoon of chocolate chips (or 1 Valhorna button), then top up with more batter till cup is 3/4 full.

Bake for about 16-20 minutes. A skewer inserted into a cupcake should come out clean. Let the cupcakes cool completely while you make the icing.

• 115g icing sugar, sifted
• 55g cream cheese, room temperature
• 10 raspberries
• 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Beat cream cheese till smooth, then add icing sugar and vanilla and beat till light and creamy. Add the raspberries and continue beating at high speed till the mixture is nice and smooth.

Spoon into an icing bag and pipe a large swirl over each cupcake. Sprinkle with red decorative sugar and top with a few sugar hearts.

White Chocolate and Cherry Cupcakes

Apart from looking crazy patriotic, these cupcakes are beyond deliciously yum.

Breakfast at Chin Mee Chin would invariably include a cherry cupcake... full of fake glace cherries and suspiciously non-dairy butter. Cheap, but tasty.

This is a much more upmarket take on an old childhood favourite. A rich buttery cake, dotted with juicy cherries and topped off with a decadent white chocolate buttercream frosting.

Cherry Cupcakes:

• 60g unsalted butter, softened at room temperature
• 65g caster sugar
• 2 eggs
• 100g plain flour
• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 30 ml syrup from canned cherries
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup canned cherries, quartered

White Chocolate Frosting:

• 60 white chocolate, finely chopped if not using buttons or chips
• 100g icing sugar, sifted
• 30ml milk
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 80g unsalted butter, softened
• Pinch of salt
• 3 drops red food colouring

Preheat oven to 190C and line 6 muffin cups with paper liners.

In a bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Using an electric mixer, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating until smooth. Beat in the vanilla, then add the flour mixture and milk and beat till smooth. Gently fold in the cherries.

Fill each cup till 3/4 full. Bake for about 16-20 minutes. A skewer inserted into a cupcake should come out clean. Let the cupcakes cool completely while you make the icing.

Melt the white chocolate in a metal bowl over gently simmering water. Stir until smooth and let cool to room temperature.

Sift the icing sugar into a medium bowl. Stir in the milk and vanilla. Add the butter and salt and beat until smooth. Stir in the cooled white chocolate. Tint half the frosting with the red food colouring for a bright red colour, and leave the other half white.

Spoon the red icing into a piping bag with a star tip, and white icing into a bag with a round tip and refrigerate for 30 minutes until firm enough to frost.

Pipe little red stars on half of each cupcake, and little round circles on the other half.

Happy National Day!

Other items on the Red, White and Ooohhh menu:

• Grilled red pepper and sundried tomato pasta
• Mozzarella and cherry tomato salad
• Boeuf bourguignon with mashed potatoes
• Red rubies in coconut milk
• Raspberry macarons with a buttercream filling
• Cream scones with homemade raspberry preserves and freshly made whipped cream

Orange Cupcakes with Lemon Buttercream

These remind me of sunshine and bright happy days.

There's something about citrus scents that chases away the blues. I'm standing at my kitchen counter sniffing away at my bottles of lemon and orange oil like a junkie, and already, I'm a little bit happier.

And besides, cupcakes are happy foods. What's there not to like about bite-sized morsels of colourful creamy fluff? Nothing, that's what.

Orange Cupcakes:

• 60g unsalted butter, softened at room temperature
• 65g caster sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon pure orange oil
• 100g plain flour
• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 30 ml milk
• 2 drops orange food colouring

Lemon Buttercream Frosting:

• 115g icing sugar, sifted
• 55g unsalted butter, softened at room temperature
• 1 teaspoon pure lemon oil
• 1 tablespoon milk or light cream
• 2 drops yellow food colouring
• Green sprinkles
• Sugar violet flowers

Preheat oven to 190C and line 6 muffin cups with paper liners.

In a bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Using an electric mixer, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating until smooth. Beat in the orange oil and colouring. Add the flour mixture and milk and beat till smooth.

Fill each cup till 3/4 full. Bake for about 16-20 minutes. A skewer inserted into a cupcake should come out clean. Let the cupcakes cool completely while you make the icing.

Cream the butter until smooth and well blended. Turn the mixer down to low and gradually beat in the icing sugar, making sure you scrape down the sides of the bowl. Add the milk and lemon oil and beat on high speed until frosting is light and fluffy (about 3 to 4 minutes). Tint the frosting with the yellow food colouring for a bright and cheery yellow colour.

Spoon the frosting into an icing bag with a star tip. Once the cupcakes have cooled, pipe a swirl of frosting over each cupcake. Decorate with green sprinkles and top off with a sugar violet.

Do you feel happy now?

Chocolate Cupcakes with a Raspberry Surprise

It's fridge clean-out day, and time to use up the random bits and pieces that are quickly approaching their use-by date.

I open my fridge and a jar of neglected raspberry jam looks sorrowfully at me. "Eat me" it says pleadingly...

It looks so lonely, the poor thing. It needs a friend. And the best friend raspberry can have is chocolate.

And good friends need to have a playground. That would be a silky creamy pool of buttercream to splash around in.

For 6 cupcakes:

• 25g dutch-processed cocoa powder
• 120 ml boiling hot water
• 80g plain flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 60g unsalted butter, room temperature
• 100g caster sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 6 teaspoons raspberry jam

For the icing:

• 115g icing sugar, sifted
• 55g unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1 tablespoon raspberry jam
• 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1 tablespoon milk or light cream
• 1 drop of red food colouring

Preheat oven to 190C and line 6 muffin cups with paper liners.

In a small bowl stir until smooth the boiling hot water and the cocoa powder. Let cool to room temperature.

In another bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt.

Using an electric mixer, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating until smooth. Beat in the vanilla extract. Add the flour mixture and beat only until incorporated. Then add the cooled cocoa mixture and stir until smooth.

Fill each muffin cup with 1 heaped tablespoon of batter, then add a teaspoon of raspberry jam, and top up with another heaped tablespoon of batter.

Bake for about 16-20 minutes. A skewer inserted into a cupcake should come out clean. Let the cupcakes cool completely while you make the icing.

Cream the butter until smooth and well blended. Add the raspberry jam and vanilla extract.

Turn the mixer down to low and gradually beat in the icing sugar, making sure you scrape down the sides of the bowl. Add the milk and beat on high speed until frosting is light and fluffy (about 3 to 4 minutes). Tint the frosting with the red food colouring for a pretty shade of pink.

Spoon the frosting into an icing bag with a star tip. Once the cupcakes have cooled, pipe little stars all over the cupcakes and decorate with sprinkles if desired.

Isn't it amazing how lonely individuals can come together to make such pretty and delicious pairings?

And I'm high enough from all the waiting
To ride a wave on your inhaling
And I'm high enough from all the waiting
To ride a wave on your inhaling
'Cause I love you no?
Can't help but love, you know...

Decadent double chocolate fudge cupcakes

There are some days when I'm so blue there's nothing that will cheer me up except these 1,000 calorie cupcakes. Or when I've got the choco-holic cravings so bad, I just want to drown in a vat of Valhorna chocolate and die.

They're dense, fudgy, gooey chocolate orgasms in little paper cups. No sex? No problem. These will make you come in your panties.

I always say, if you're gonna eat those calories, don't waste it on crap chocolate. Use the best, go for broke on Valhorna. Trust me, your ass will be gigantic, but it'll be worth it.

For the cupcakes:

• 1 oz unsweetened dark chocolate
• 3 tbsp unsalted butter, softened
• 1/2 cup lightly packed demerara sugar
• 1 egg yolk
• 1/2 cup plain flour
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp pure Madagascar vanilla extract
• Pinch of salt

For the frosting:

• 1 oz unsweetened dark chocolate
• 1/2 tbsp unsalted butter, softened
• 1/2 cup icing sugar, sifted
• 2 tsp milk
• 1/2 tsp pure Madagascar vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 190C.

To make cupcakes, melt chocolate and butter in a bowl over lightly simmering water. Resist urge to eat chocolate at this point.

In a separate bowl, sift the flour, baking powder and salt.

Cream the egg yolk, butter and sugar in another bowl till light, fluffy and pale yellow. If feeling frustrated at work, envision asshole in question and beat the crap out of him/her. Otherwise, make significant other put in some elbow grease. Or, like me, just use the KitchenAid mixer.

Fold in the flour mixture. When incorporated, add in melted chocolate and vanilla and mix well.

Divide batter between 6 paper lined cupcake tins and bake for 18-20 minutes. You'll know when it's done when an inserted toothpick comes out clean.

Inhale divine chocolate aroma and try not to spazz out.

For the icing, melt chocolate and butter in the same way. Once melted, remove from heat and let cool for a minute, then stir in icing sugar. Add the milk and vanilla and you'll have an icing so glossy you'll see your face in it. Frost when cupcakes are completely cool.

Position yourself on the couch, put on "How I Met Your Mother", peel back cupcake wrapper, take a bite, die and go to chocolate heaven.