Baking Mondays - Neapolitan Cupcakes

Ah what a disaster. The plan was to make rocky road cupcakes. I chopped up the cherries, marshmallows and peanuts, covered the bowl in cling wrap and then went out to visit some friends. When we got home I was all psyched up to finish the cupcakes but soon discovered that ants had gotten into the rocky road mix! It was extremely disappointing and I nearly gave up there and then, but when I realised that I had all the necessary ingredients for neapolitan cupcakes I was in business again. So without further ado...

Neapolitan Cupcakes (from The Australian Women's Weekly - Cupcakes)

Makes 12

125g butter, softened

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

150g caster sugar

2 eggs

185g self-raising flour

80ml milk

pink food colouring

strawberry essence

1 tbspn cocoa powder

2 tsps milk, extra

1. Preheat oven to moderate. Line 12 hole muffin pan with paper cases.
2. Beat butter, vanilla, sugar and eggs with an electric mixer until light and fluffy. Stir in the sifted flour and milk, in two batches.
3. Divide mixture evenly among 3 bowls. Tint one mixture pink and flavour with strawberry essence. Blend sifted cocoa with extra milk in cup, stir into another mixture. Leave third mixture plain.
4. Drop alternate spoonfuls of the 3 mixtures into cases. Pull a skewer through the mixtures to give a marbled effect.
5. Bake for 20 minutes. Turn onto a wire rack to cool.
6. Decorate with butter cream.

Neapolitan Butter Cream

125g butter, softened

240g icing sugar

2 tbsps milk

pink food colouring

strawberry essence

1 tbsp cocoa powder

2 tsps milk, extra

Beat butter with electric mixer until as white as possible. Beat in sifted icing sugar and milk in two batches. Divide mixture into 3 bowls and flavour butter cream in a similar style to the cupcake mixture.

Note: I added the strawberry essence to give it a true neapolitan flavour, the original recipe just used pink food colouring.

So the verdict?

Me - 7/10, pretty good - I think I would add a tad bit more strawberry essence to the cake and I would like to decorate it differently next time.

Mat - 8/10, sugary goodness - he is looking forward to having another one tomorrow.

One more photo of the cupcakes, this is the inside of the cake...