Love Is In The Air Heart Cupcakes

Love Is In The Air Heart Cupcakes

Love is definitely in the air if you recreate my heart cupcakes to serve a loved one. I am sure these cupcakes would be perfect for Saint Valentines Day or any other special romantic occasion! Do you love someone enough to give them your last cupcake? *Giggle*.

My cupcakes consist of a chocolate sponge base with a filling of cherry brandied cherries, buttercream icing, piped around the edge with a sponge cut out heart for a lid and the grand finale, chocolate hearts and sprinkles, this is pure temptation in a cupcake!

Tip: Look out for miniature bottles of liqueurs for recipes, it saves buying in larger bottles if you don’t intend using them very often.

Close up shot of cupcake

Love Is In The Air Heart Cupcakes

Makes 12 medium sized cupcakes

Ingredients
For The Chocolate Sponge
175g (6 oz) soft butter
175g (6 oz) caster sugar
3 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
150g (5 oz) self-raising flour
25g (1 oz) cocoa powder
1 tsp baking powder
For The Cherry Brandied Filling
425g (15 oz) can of pitted black cherries in fruit juice
1 tbsp cherry brandy
1 tsp cornflour
For The Buttercream Icing
50g (2 oz) soft butter
100g (4 oz) icing sugar
Few drops of vanilla extract
1 tbsp milk
For The Chocolate Hearts
100g (4 oz) white chocolate
Few drops of edible pink food colouring
For Decoration
Pink sugar sprinkles (optional)
Pink sugar balls (optional)

You will also need 12-cupcake tin fitted with 12 cupcake cases of your choice, piping bag fitted with a small icing nozzle and non-stick baking paper and a small heart shaped cookie cutter or heart shaped template.

Method

Starting with the chocolate hearts, melt the white chocolate in a bowl set over the top of a saucepan filled with a little water barley simmering. The bowl must not touch the water, it make take up to 10 minutes for the chocolate to melt. Take off the heat to cool slightly then add a few drops of edible pink food colouring, stirring in with a wooden spoon until fully combined. Spoon into a piping bag fitted with a small icing nozzle and pipe 24 heart shapes onto the non-stick baking paper leave to fully set. You can make these the day before if you wish.

Preheat the oven to 190°C/fan 170°C/375°F/Gas mark 5.

To make the chocolate sponge, in a large mixing bowl cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Add 1 egg at a time beating in well with each addition and then beat in the vanilla extract. In sieve above the mixture in the bowl, sieve the flour, cocoa and baking powder. With a large metal spoon carefully fold in the flour mixture until fully combined. Spoon the sponge mixture into the cupcakes filling no more than three-quarters full. Place into the preheated oven and bake for 15 –20 minutes or until fully cooked and skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. Leave to cool in the cupcake tin for 5 minutes before turning out onto a wire rack to completely cool.

For the cherry brandied cherries, strain the juice from the cherries and place the juice into a saucepan. Mix the cornflour with a little of the juice from the saucepan and leave aside. Place the saucepan onto the stove and bring to boil and keep boiling for about 5 - 10 minutes to reduce the juice. Stirring with a wooden spoon add the cornflour mix to thicken the cherry juice and cook through for a minute or two. Take off the heat and add the cherry brandy and leave the cherry mixture to fully cool.

Next make the buttercream icing, in a mixing bowl add the soft butter and give it a good beat with a wooden spoon. Sieve the icing sugar and add to the butter beating in well until light and fluffy. Then add the milk and vanilla extract again beating in well making a creamy butter icing. Cover with a damp tea towel and leave aside.

To assemble the heart cupcakes, with a heart shaped cutter or template, cut out the middle of each cupcake, leaving the heart shaped sponges aside for the lids. Spoon in the cherry brandied cherries into the centre of each cupcake; any juice will soak into the sponge giving it a wonderful flavour! Next fill the piping bag with a small icing nozzle, on each cupcake pipe around the edge of the cherries into heart shapes. Sprinkle over the pink sugar strands and pink sugar balls if using. Pipe a little buttercream onto the top edge of the sponge lids from cutting out the heart shapes. Place the lids onto an angle to show the fruit and sprinkles. To finish off, carefully peel off the chocolate hearts from the non-stick paper and stick a chocolate heart each side of each cupcake. Voila you have your “Love Is In The Air Heart Cupcakes”.