Iced Vanilla Cupcakes

I decided to have a bit of a fun night off from the dreaded dissertation at the weekend and make some childish cupcakes! I realised I have a lot of sprinkles in my baking cupboard and thought this was a pretty good way of getting rid of a few of them. Everyone loves an iced cupcake as well!

Some of the decorations were done by my other half, so this is a really fun activity to do with friends/partners/kids as something a little bit different. Just be wary because the sprinkles do end up everywhere! The yellow cakes have lemon extract in the icing and some of the red ones have strawberry flavouring to give whoever gets one a bit of a surprise when they bite in.

Ingredients

Cupcakes:-

180g butter

180g caster sugar

1 1/2 tsp vanilla essence

3 medium eggs

210g self-raising flour

Icing:-

220g icing sugar

2-3 tablespoons water

Food colouring

Sprinkles

Flavourings

Recipe

1) Preheat the oven to 180C/gas mark 4 and line two 12-hole cupcakes tins. I managed to make 18 cakes out of this mix.

2) Beat the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy.

3) Add the vanilla essence, eggs and 1 tablespoon of flour.

4) Beat until combined then gradually add the flour, making sure to keep mixing.

5) Spoon the mixture in the cupcake cases then bake for 20-25 minutes.

6) Leave to cool in the tin slightly then remove and allow to cool completely on a cooling rack.

7) Once fully cool, place the icing sugar in a bowl then add a tablespoon of water at a time until the icing is the right consistency. If you're using flavourings/colourings then make sure it is quite thick as the flavours/colours will thin it a bit more.

8) Divide into separate bowls for each colour of icing you need.

9) Decorate to your heart's content!