Making cupcakes, some tips required please?

[ClaireDeLoon]

OK I fancy making some pretty cupcakes this weekend and I have a few questions please.

Firstly - how do you get the tops level?

Secondly (and yes I know it is minor and picky) - the cake cases I have are more for fairy cakes yet when you see them done professionally they have straight sides

so like this

www.grandmasecrets.com/pages/cupcakes.jpg

Where do I get those cakes cases and what sort of tin do I bake them in.

Thirdly - has anyone got a nice frosting recipe please?

Finally - is I wanted to make the cakes raspberry flavour would you just puree and seive the raspberries to get a seedless puree and add that to the recipe do you think?

Hopefully someone can answer at least one

I find lowering the oven temperature by 10 degrees or so reduces the 'peakiness' of the rise. Sounds like Stirling's recipe also solves the problem though - shall give that one a go next time. Thanks.

red velvet cupcakes don't rise either, they're in the receipe section

neither do the hummingbird cakes

i do really 'get' the fairycake thing - i own a very well used cake mix splattered copy of nigella's domestic goddess book - an old boyfriend bought it for me with only a slight hint of irony and i was well chuffed.

I even like muffins (tho have never made one) that's why its weird that i have a problem with cupcakes. go figure!

i am a miniature cake snob!

Just wanted to thank StirlingtheStrong - was inspired by this thread to make some birthday cupcakes for a friend and your recipe and icing worked a treat!

Although I do lots of baking, it was actually the first time I've tried flat topped cupcakes with piped icing and pretty sprinkles, and they looked very nice, especially with a silver candle stuck in the top. Friend was very pleased!

I'm going to make some more tonight as they were universally loved and admired and also it is my birthday tomorrow and I bet no other bugger will bake/buy me a cake, oh no

Make them in muffin cases and muffin tins, then you have a lip so that you can pour, lots of icing on top (use royal icing powder not ordinary icing sugar)

I make sponge mixture the french way, weigh your eggs (out of the shell) and then use the same weight of butter, caster sugar and self raising flour, if I am in a hurry I add a wee bit of baking powder and beat them all together with an electric mixer, otherwise i do the creaming the butter and sugar, adding eggs then flour thing.

wiggly - That is a fairy cake recipe, not a cupcake recipe.

It was only recently that I realised there was a difference.

I dont think the fairy cakes keep well after a day or so but the cupcake recipe keeps well for a few days!

Stirling it is a sponge cake recipe , I prefer a "proper" sponge with loads of real butter and eggs in, I am a sponge snob. I think they are better made bigger like American cupcakes tho' because you get more moist fluffy centre in a bigger cake and the lip of muffin paper means you can put more icing on. I don't like vanilla flavour in cakes either, some lemon zest is much more sophisticated .
Too much baking powder gives me wind.

Ooh yes, I made a batch of the cupcakes yesterday but with lemon zest and they were gorgeous.

The cupcake recipe I posted is light and fluffy too - I was surprised how good they were with comparitively little butter

I'm not saying your cakes aren't light and fluffy Stirling I'm sure they are, I just like recipes that I don't have to remember the quantities for, or look up in a book, I am a over 40 and my memory is not what it was.

I took the plunge and got some cupcake wrappers, they are fab, so easy to use but you definately need cupcakes to fill them, fairy cakes will just not do! Love their cupcake pictures, if only... www.cupcakestyle.co.uk