Halloween Trick or Treat Cupcakes - Baking Tutorial

I don't usually do baking tutorials or food related posts on my blog but I want to throw some more lifestyle posts into the mix (pun not intended!) And besides, it's Halloween and I was feeling rather festive today. After seeing a lot of other bloggers getting creative in the kitchen and looking at amazing cupcake designs on Tumblr, I decided to have a go myself and make some traditional cupcakes, but with a Halloween theme.

The 20 cakes I made today are a mixture of vanilla and chocolate sponge with either vanilla frosting or Nutella over the top. Decorations include marshmallows and chocolate writing icing. Here is a quick tutorial of how to create your own Halloween cupcakes using my family's simple recipe. Please note that if you do desire to make 20 cakes, you need to double the measurements. If you also wish to do half vanilla and half chocolate like I did, then split the mixture evenly between two different mixing bowls and for the chocolate sponge, don't forget to add cocoa powder.

Ingredients:

100g self raising flour
100g soft margarine
100g caster sugar
Cocoa powder (for chocolate sponge only!)
2 eggs

List of optional decorations:

Large white marshmallows
Mini marshmallows
Writing icing (various colours)
Hundreds and thousands sprinkles
Nutella
Pre made vanilla frosting

Method:

1. Pre heat the oven to 190°C/Gas Mark 5 (or 374°F)
2. Mix the margarine and sugar in a large bowl till it is creamy
3. Add eggs and flour a bit at a time and mix with a wooden spoon together smoothly. If you wish to make chocolate sponge cakes, add cocoa powder to mix little by little until the mixture turns a light shade of brown.
4. Once mixture is smooth and free of any lumps, carefully spoon a large teaspoonful of mixture into the cake cases
5. Place baking tray of cupcakes into the oven for 15-20 minutes

This made sound like common sense but prevent opening the oven within the first 5 minutes of cooking as cakes may sink!!!

Decorating:

Once cupcakes are cool, you can start to turn your ordinary cakes into something extraordinary. If you are a little bit nervous about decorating, feel free to sketch out rough ideas on a piece of paper before starting. Here are some of my favourite designs from today as a little bit of inspiration:

The Ghost Emoji
Inspired by the ghost emoji on iPhones, I first got a white marshmallow and drew the face design onto one side using chocolate and pink writing icing. I then covered the top of the cakes in either vanilla frosting or Nutella followed by a not so light sprinkling of hundreds and thousands (the more the better) I then placed the marshmallow on top lightly pushing into the icing to avoid breakages along the way.

The Spider Web
The spider web was created simply by covering a frosted cupcake in writing icing in a spider web. Yep, beauty really is that simple

The Tombstone
For a grave adventure, I covered a cake in Nutella spread. I then cut a white marshmallow in half and wrote the letters "RIP" on it to make it look like a gravestone. I then propped the marshmallow onto the cake using mini marshmallows and dazzled any remaining surface with white writing icing.


I had a lot of fun making these cakes but please make sure you have plenty of patience for the icing part. Maybe next Halloween, my little simple recipe may find you and it will come in handy for a party or small family gathering. A cute yet devilish Halloween treat.

Happy baking!

Hayley x









For blog post requests, tweet me @hayleywhispers