Valentine’s day is just around the corner and so I’ve been thinking about home made gifts with a romantic theme. Last week I made heart shaped macrons and these easy hidden heart cupcakes. All you need to make them is vanilla cupcake batter and cake cases, a small heart shaped cutter, some red and pink food colouring, some frosting for the top and some sprinkles. I used a basic vanilla cupcake recipe (below). I made the cupcakes in PME red and pink heart cases and decorated them with strawberry flavored frosting, lip shaped sprinkles and chocolate filigree hearts all of which were kindly provided by the Cake Decorating Store for review.

Hidden heart cupcakes ingredients

125g Unsalted butter (softened)
125g Caster sugar
2 Eggs (beaten)
125g Self raising flour
1 tsp Vanilla essence
Splash of whole milk
Red gel food colour
Pink gel food colour

Method:

• Preheat the oven to 170C
• Grease and line a small cake tin or baking tray with a raised edge.
• To soften the butter you could simply leave it on the side for an hour, but I always forget so I place it in a microwavable bowl and heat in 10 second bursts, removing and mixing each time. The aim is to soften the butter a little not to melt it. If the butter does melt a little, use a fork to mix it back together with the rest of the butter.
• In a freestanding mixer cream the softened butter and sugar until smooth.
• Add the vanilla essence to the beaten egg then slowly add the mixture to the mixer.
• Gradually add the flour while mixing on a slow speed.

• Add the whole milk slowly while mixing by hand until the mixture falls easily from a spoon or spatula.
• Remove approximately 1/4 of the mixture and place in a separate bowl. Add red food colour to this mixture and spread in a thin layer (about 1cm thick) in your per-greased and lined cake tin or baking tray. don’t worry about reaching the edges of the tin it doesn’t matter what shape you end up with.
• Bake the red coloured sponge in the preheated oven for about 10 minutes or until the cake is springy to the touch. Remove from the tin and allow to cool.
• Meanwhile add a little pink to the remaining 3/4 of cake batter.
• Use the small heart cutter to cut out hearts from the cooled red cake then stand these up in the cake cases. The pink batter in the bottom will support them.
• Fill around the hearts with the remaining pink cake batter.
• Bake for approx 20 minutes or until a cake tester comes out clean.
• Decorate by swirling the strawberry frosting from a piping bag or spreading with the back of a spoon / pallet knife. Add sprinkles and hearts for a final romantic touch.