The time has swung back around pretty quickly and soon I will be lining up the lunch boxes and trying to make them interesting. What a drudge. Undoubtedly having some fillers on stand-by can speed up the task of lunch making and one of my mainstays is a plain cupcake. There, I just called it a cupcake. I always knew them as queen cakes and sometimes fairy cakes but cup cakes where did that come from? Perhaps ‘Magnolia Bakery’ is to blame as that is where the character Miranda ate hers in ‘Sex and The City’. If I remember correctly the icing, sorry frosting, was blue. Well the lunch-box queen cake is going to have to be a bit more subtle than that. With healthy school lunch policies we can’t be filling the box with something that screams “SWEET”, especially when the lunch-box police (aka your child’s best friend) can’t stop themselves from reporting any non-conforming edibles. So a plain bun it is. These ones were given a little lift with a spoon of cocoa powder and iced for home consumption with chocolate icing, crumbled Cadbury’s Flake and sprinkles but for school we will be keeping them plain.
Plain or Chocolate Queen Cake (makes 12)
You Will Need:
2 eggs
100g self-raising flour
1 heaped tbsp cocoa powder (for chocolate version)
100g caster sugar
100g unsalted butter
½ tsp baking powder
½ tsp vanilla extract
Method:
Heat the oven to 190C. Line a bun tray with paper cake cases.
Beat the butter until soft and then add the sugar and beat well.
Sieve the flour, baking powder (& cocoa powder if using) into a bowl together.
Add one egg to the butter mix and beat in.
Add half the flour mixture and beat in.
Add the remaining egg and beat followed by the last of the flour and mix well.
Spoon dollops of the mix into the paper cases and bake for 15 mins.
Allow to cool on a wire tray. Enjoy.
Til next time,
Sheila
Gimme The Recipe - You came for the food now stay for the romance! 