Thursday 25 April 2013

Honey, Almond and White Chocolate Cupcakes

Almond, Honey and White Chocolate Cupcakes

Last September, a colleague of mine who lives on Anglesey, gave me some of her wonderful honey. It's pale gold with a beautiful floral scent and delicate taste. Although most of it went very quickly, I managed to keep some of it back, as I have been wanting to try baking with honey for some time.

While I was at university, I was lucky enough to live for a year in the beautiful city of Dijon. As well as having fond memories of the famous mustard (I lived opposite the Amora factory and was often greeted by the overwhelming smell of vinegar whenever I opened my window), the local speciality of pain d'épice featured largely in any social visits during my time there. It's a lightly-spiced cake, heavy with honey but like so many traditional cake recipes, it has quite a dry texture. Nice though it is (and it certainly goes very well with a glass or two of something sparkling), I wanted my first foray into baking with honey to be rather more elegant, with subtle flavours, suitable perhaps for a genteel tea.

These honey, almond and white chocolate fairy cakes were what I came up with and I have to say that they did live up to my expectations. The honey gives them a delicate perfume and the almonds add a pleasing crunch. They are topped with a ganache made of white chocolate which would not be my usual choice but I felt that white chocolate would work better with the dainty, understated flavours of the cake.



As this month's letter is 'A' in the brilliant Alphabakes challenge by Ros (this month's host) from TheMoreThanOccasionalBaker and Caroline  at Caroline Makes, I'm sending this as my entry. I'm also entering it into the Tea Time Treats Challenge, with the theme of Fairy Cakes, Muffins and Cupcakes , run by Karen of Lavender and Lovage  and Kate (this month's host) from What Kate Baked

As this month's challenge is Honey, I'm also entering these fairy cakes into April's We Should Cocoa challenge started and hosted by Choclette from Chocolate Log Blog and Chele from Chocolate Teapot





RECIPE - makes 12 cupcakes

  • For the cakes
120g softened butter
100g caster sugar
120g self raising flour
half a teaspoon baking powder
2 large eggs
1 tablespoon runny honey
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
50 g chopped, blanched almonds
  • For the ganache 
100ml double cream
200g good quality white chocolate, chopped

METHOD

12-bun muffin tin lined with 12 cupcake or muffin papers

 Pre-heat the oven to 180°C

Cream the butter and sugar together. Add the eggs one at a time, whisking well after each addition. Mix in the vanilla and honey
Sieve the flour and baking powder and fold in. Lastly, fold in the chopped almonds.

Spoon the mixture in to the cases, filling each case as equally as possible.

Put in the oven and bake for about 20 mins or until the cakes are cooked and golden brown on top.

Remove from the oven. Take the cakes out of the tin as soon as you can and leave to cool on a wire rack.

To make the ganache, heat the cream gently until almost but not quite boiling and pour over the chopped chocolate. Leave to stand for a minute or two and then stir until all the chocolate is melted. Leave to cool for about 10 minutes so that it thickens slightly which makes it easier to use. 

When the cakes are completely cold, spread thickly with the ganache. 

Honey, Almond and White Chocolate Cupcakes
                                                 


13 comments:

  1. They sound beautiful and look delicious!

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    1. Thank you - they're perfect for a girlie get together!

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  2. They sound lush, and look moist :-) x

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    1. Thanks - they are light, moist and fragrant!

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  3. I too have just baked some honey cupcakes- substituting half the caster sugar for the honey. It resulted in a lovely sweet fragrant bake. Thank you for entering these into TTT!

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  4. I love baking with honey and have some from Australia which I'm slowly savouring. Thanks for entering AlphaBakes.

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    1. This was my first attempt at baking with honey really and I'm keen to do some more! I'll have to pop over to see some of your honey ideas!

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  5. They look delicious! White chocolate and almond is a wonderful flavour combination.

    Hope you are well love, take care :) xxx

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    1. Thanks! I'm not usually keen on white chocolate but it did work well with the almonds.

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  6. I have been terrible at participating in blog challenges, esp. as WSC is one of my faves held by a blogger friend. I love the look of your cakes, white chocolate is plentiful in my home as my husband likes it and I like almonds.

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    1. WSC is a great challenge, I agree! Glad you like these little cakes and thanks for popping by!

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  7. Oh I definitely commented on this post back in April - must be Blogger playing up again. No idea what I said, but I'm sure it was complimentary because these look delightful. Thank you for entering these into WSC and sorry if it seems like I was neglecting your post.

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