'Death by Oreo' cupcakes!

Sorry for how quiet it's been here the last month! I had exams so had to get my head down and hit the books for a couple of weeks in preparation. However, it's over and done with now, so normal service shall resume!

'Death by Oreo' cupcakes (makes roughly 20)

Ingredients:

2 packets of normal sized Oreo cookies

1 box of mini sized Oreo cookies

Dry Ingredients:

225g self-raising flour
225g sugar
21g cocoa powder
1 teaspoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon of salt

Wet Ingredients:
120ml milk
2 eggs
55g chocolate (melted)
110ml boiling water
90ml oil
½ tablespoon vanilla

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 180 degress celcius.

2. Line a muffin pan (a cupcake pan will be fine if you don't) with large paper cases.

3. Take an oreo, and carefully twist it open. Place the biscuit with the icing on at the bottom of the case, repeat. (It's good to have an extra packet of Oreos for the inevitable casualties!) Keep the other half of the oreo for the frosting.

3. Place your chocolate in a small bowl, and then place over a pan of simmering water until it is melted. Remove from heat and allow to cool slightly.

4. In a large bowl, whisk together all your dry ingredients.

5. In another large bowl, whisk your eggs until they thicken slightly and turn pale in colour.

6. To the egg mix, add in the milk, vanilla and oil and whisk well.

7. Then add in the cooled chocolate, and again whisk.

8. Add the wet mix into the dry mix, (or vice verus depending on which bowl is bigger!) and mix just to combine. Then mix in your hot water.

 9. Fill the cupcake liners about 3/4 of the way full (due to this it was hard to work out how many cupcakes the recipe would actually produce, so I had a couple without oreos in the bottom).

 10. Bake in the oven for around 15-18 minutes, or until when the sponge bounces back when pressed lightly with a fingertip.

 Frosting ingredients:

125g unsalted butter

250g icing sugar

1-2tbp milk

1 tsp vanilla extract

Oreo halves (crushed)

1. While the cupcakes are cooling, you can make a start on the frosting. First of all, take your oreo halves and blitz them either in a food processor, or place in a freezer bag and bash with a rolling pill until they reach crumb consistency.

 

2. Whisk together the butter and icing sugar, adding a splash of the milk and vanilla extract until the mixture is light and fluffy.

3. Mix in the oreo crumbs.

 4. Once the cupcakes are cooled, either pipe on the frosting with a piping bag and nozzle, or just spread over the cake with a knife.

5. Cut a mini oreo in half, and place it on either side of the cupcake. (Note, best to do this before serving, as mini oreo's go soft very quickly in the frosting!)

 Recipe adapted via a cup full of cake.

3D Dino Cake - Round Two!

The morning after the disastrous attempt before, I had another go. I used a different template on this occasion, which can be found here! The template provided is for 9 inch cake tins, but I only had one. Not trusting my sponge enough to rise enough to be cut in two and limited time, I decided to do one 9 inch and the other an 8 inch, just meaning I had to trim my template down a little.

For the sponge, I used Mary Berry's Victoria Sponge recipe which can be found here! The sponge was a lot easier to carve, and was also much sturdier than the Red Velvet. One downfall of the 3D cake template was at some points it is a little vague, especially when it comes down to the dinosaur's legs so I had to freestyle it a litte. Here he is after his crumb coat of icing.

 

It was a very sloppy crumb coat, as I had ran out of butter and was in a rush to get to the birthday boy's lunch! After a well-needed break away from the dinosaur (I would say we had a love-hate relationship!) I bought some more butter and cracked on after lunch.

The instructions suggested piping stars all over the dinosaur's body, but to be honest I was running out of patience and again, butter! So I decided just to pipe the stars down his spine and tail, and just do another coat of icing with a palette knife over the rest. I then decorated his spine with a mix of chocolate drops and milk and white chocolate buttons. (I always seem to make dinosaurs spotty!)

I also fashioned him some teeth out of a chopped up white button,  along with eyes out of chocolate drops. (Apologies for the shoddy icing job on his neck!)

Overall, I was really proud of what I was able to do. It might not have been what I imagined, but it was certainly dinosaur-looking! Unfortunately, 3D dino had to meet his end in quite a gruesome way...

Until next time!


Be sure to check other delicious treats at Sweets for a Saturday!