Piñata Cupcakes

I had so much fun making and photographing these Piñata cupcakes. Don't they just look so fun and engaging? This was my first attempt at the Piñata technique, and to my surprise it wasn't as hard as I thought it would be. I did however learn that I should of stuffed it more with smarties for two reasons. Reason one being it didn't have the desired spill out effect I was hoping for and because you can never have too many smarties. One thing thats great about this recipe is that you can adapt it to almost any flavour and combination. You could make these with any mini chocolates or sweets and change the sponge recipe to any flavour. For example you could have a chocolate cupcake with mini white chocolate buttons inside. Or stick to a vanilla cupcake and pop millions inside for a sweet version.

Piñata Cupcakes
(Makes 12)
125g Self raising flour

125g Caster sugar 

125g Butter 

1/4 Tsp Bicarbonate of soda 

2 Eggs 

1 1/2 Tbsp Milk 

1/4 Tsp Vanilla extract 

Decoration

150g Mini Smarties

1 400g Tub Vanilla Buttercream 

Six food gel colourings of your choice

Preheat the oven to 170C, Gas Mark 5. Line a cupcake tin with 12 cases.

In a large mixing bowl place all of the cupcake ingredients inside and whisk together using an electric hand mixer until smooth. This should take around three to four minutes.

Equally distribute the mixture between the cupcake cases, filling them three quarters of the way full. Place in the oven for 18 minutes until golden brown or if a skewer comes out clean. Leave to cool in the tin for 5 minutes before transferring onto a cooling rack to cool completely.

Using a paint brush, paint strips of food gel up the sides of a piping bag with a star nozzle attached. I used primary bright colours to reflect a Piñata, however you can use any colours of your choice. Place the vanilla frosting inside and twist the end of the piping bag to avoid spillage.

Using a cupcake corer, or apple corer, take the middle of the cupcake out, making sure you don't go all the way to the bottom of the cupcake as you want it to keep its shape. Fill the middle of each cupcake with mini smarties, pat them down so you can fit a few more in. Then place the middle back on top.

Place the piping bag in the middle of the cupcake and push down whilst in circular motions to create a swirl of coloured frosting.

Repeat until all the cupcakes are decorated.

Will last up to four days in an air tight container.