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I was looking for a pineapple cupcake recipe, because my mum lurves pineapple and until now I've forced my own cupcake preferences onto her! I've removed any actual alcohol from the recipe, but you can replace the rum essence with rum if you prefer.

Ingredients

1 1/3 c flour
1 c sugar
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 c butter, melted
1/3 c pineapple juice
3 tsp rum extract
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 size 7 eggs
1 egg yolk
1/3 c shredded coconut
1/3 c crushed pineapple, well drained

Preheat oven to 175 C and line a 12 hole cupcake tin, and half of another (this makes 18 cupcakes).

Into a bowl, sift the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt, then add the coconut. Put the dry ingredients to the side while you combine the wet.

In a large bowl, mix the melted butter, pineapple juice, rum extract, and vanilla until it turns a lighter colour. One at a time add the eggs and egg yolk, beating for about 30 secs in between each.

Once the eggs are mixed in, add the dry ingredients a little at a time to the liquid, beating for a few seconds in between. Once all the dry ingredients have been added, beat the mixture on high for 4 minutes. Finally, fold in the pineapple.

Fill the cupcake liners to approx. 3/4, and bake for 20 mins. The cupcakes are very moist when they come out, don't worry about this! You can assure yourself by testing the cupcake with a toothpick just to make sure it comes out clean.

Icing

140 g cream cheese (softened)
1/2 c butter (softened)
1 c powdered sugar
1 tsp coconut essence
1/2 tsp vanilla essence
1/4 tsp lemon juice (bottled is perfectly fine)

Cream all the ingredients until smooth and pop into the fridge until the cupcakes are cooked and cooled. I love to randomly put cocktail umbrellas in the cupcakes just to make them look more like the namesake, but you could also sprinkle them with a little more dessicated coconut.

These cupcakes instantly make me visualise summer! I'm not a big fan of hot spice, so I reduced the amount of chili by about 70% and added some white chocolate to 'cool the mouth' just like milk would.

Very tasty, very pretty (especially if you add a couple of cocktail umbrellas to the plate for some extra spunk) and a great talking point!


Ingredients

1 c flour
1/2 c sugar
1/3 c butter
3/4 c milk
1/2 c white chocolate chips (or 1 small milky bar!)
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp chili powder (increase this if you like more bite)
1 egg
1 fresh mango roughly cubed OR
3/4 canned mango roughly cubed
1/4 cup mango pulp (if fresh mango) or juice (if canned mango)

Preheat oven to 175 and line a 12 hole cupcake pan. Heat the milk in a bowl over a saucepan of boiling water until it's just below boiling. Remove from the heat and add the white chocolate to the milk, stirring until it melts completely. Let the mixture cool completely before moving to the next step.

In a large bowl, cream the butter and sugar, then add the egg, stirring until combined. Add flour, baking powder, chili powder, and salt to the mixture.
Next, add the cooled chocolate milk and mango juice/pulp and beat until well combined. Finally, fold in mango.

Fill the cupcake liners 3/4 of the way full with the batter, trying to spread the mango chunks evenly if you can. Bake about 15 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean.

Icing

120 g cream cheese
1 1/2 c icing sugar
1 TBS lime juice
1 drop green food coloring

In a large bowl, beat the cream cheese and icing sugar until it's smooth. Add the lime juice, then just enough green food colouring to give the icing a pale lime colour. Mix again until blended.

I went out to dinner last night and a friend started talking about the Margarita night she'd had down at the Mexican Cafe, which started me thinking about how I could mix tequila into a cupcake! I came across a vegan recipe for Margarita Cupcakes, which I decided to adapt to a non-vegan version. I then decided to up the ante and make this a Strawberry Margarita Cupcake... MMMMM!

There's a lot of recipes out there for this using thing like coolade (which we can't get here and why would you want to use something so artificial anyway?) or strawberry margarita mix, but I think my version is pretty much as close as you can get to a REAL strawberry margarita in cake form.. Well, other than the canned strawberries!

Ingredients

1/4 cup lime juice
1 cup canned strawberries, drained (keep the syrup to the side)
1/2 c of the strawberry syrup from the can
1/2 c milk
1/4 c vegetable oil
2 tsp tequila
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 c sugar
1 1/3 c flour
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt

Preheat your oven to 175 C and line 2 x 12 hole cupcake trays. Sift the flour, baking soda, baking powder, sugar and salt into a large bowl. Add the rest of the ingredients and beat the mixture for at least 3 minutes, until it's smooth and fluffy.

Fill the cupcake liners 3/4 of the way full with the batter and bake until the cupcakes spring back when pressed, around 20-24 minutes.

Icing

1 egg white
1 1/4 c icing sugar
3 c fresh strawberries pureed OR
1 c strawberries in syrup pureed (drain the syrup first)
2 TBS Tequila

Beat the egg white until soft peaks form. Gradually beat in icing sugar, then the pureed strawberries and finally the tequila. Mix until combined.

Once you've iced the cupcakes, roll the edges in the loose sugar, to give the same effect as a salted glass, and you're done!

I was in the supermarket the other day and came across those cute little bottles of baby cham they sell. I don't actually drink the stuff, but I've always thought those bottles were extremely cute so I decided to find something to do with them!

Ingredients

2 3/4 c flour
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1 c butter
2 c sugar
3 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup champagne*
3 ripe pears, peeled, cored and grated OR
1 cup canned pears, grated and well drained


Preheat your oven to 170C and line 2 x 12 hole cupcake pans.

In a large bowl, cream the butter and sugar until they are fluffy and create light peaks, this will take a couple of minutes. Add the eggs one at a time, making sure each one is thoroughly blended before you add the next.

Sift the flour, baking soda and salt into another bowl, then slowly add it to the batter, little by little to ensure that you're knocking in as much air as you're knocking out. This method of adding the dry ingredients ensures a really light cupcake, so be sure not to skip this as we've got a heavy ingredient to add yet! Make sure it's completely blended.

Add the vanilla and champagne to the mix and beat on high for at least 3 minutes. You should have a nice smooth and airy mixture at this point. Finally, add the pears to the mix on a slow speed.

Spoon the mixture into the cupcake pans, filling to around 3/4. Bake for 20- 25 minutes or until they are golden brown, and spring back.

Icing

1/8 c softened butter
120 g cream cheese
1 1/2 c icing sugar
1 TBS champagne

To make the icing, cream the butter and cream cheese and add the icing sugar using a low speed. Switch to a high speed and mix until blended - you can add more icing sugar if you feel it's a little wet.

Variation

You can make these cupcakes even more special by using a rose champagne, and adding a tiny drop (about the size of a pin head - no more!) to each your batter and icing to create a light pastel pink colour.

These cupcakes are gluten free,contain fresh fruit - you could almost pretend they were healthy if they weren't really just mini baked cheesecakes! They can be frozen too, so they're great to make in advance and then just pull out the night before you need them :)

Ingredients

1 1/2 c sugar
710 g light cream cheese, softened
1 tsp vanilla essence
4 eggs
1 1/2 c raspberries (frozen is fine - just thaw them first)

Preheat oven to 176C and line 2 x 12 hole cupcake tins.

In a large bowl, use a hand mixer to blend the sugar, cream cheese, and vanilla. Add eggs to cream cheese mixture one at a time and blend after adding each egg.

Fill the cupcake liners 3/4 of the way full with cream cheese batter and divide the raspberries evenly between the 24 cupcakes by sprinkling them on top and pushing them in lightly.

Bake for 25 minutes. Remove from oven and let stand for 5 minutes.
Note: A well will form in the middle of each cupcake - this is fine!

Turn the oven up to 230C, you'll put the cupcakes back in once you've added the topping!

Topping

235 g light cream cheese
1/4 c sugar

Beat the ingredients together, then place a dollop in the centre of your cupcakes. Return the cupcakes to the oven, and bake for 5 minutes.

Remove from the oven, and let them cool for a while. Once cool, pop them in the fridge and let them set for about an hour before eating.

These cupcakes need to be kept refrigerated.