Yes, all those little red hearts are for you!!! A Big Fat Greek style THANK YOU to each and every fabulous one of you for reading my blog, following and leaving sweet comments (replied to y'days). Like some of the newer Blogger's out there, it's kinda reassuring to know that you're not talking to yourself!
I have a lot of blog reading catching up this weekend, thanks to Vahni over at the amazing Grit & Glamour, who has listed the blogs that she's following and reading - it's huge & pretty phenomenal. I've just seen that V has a brilliantly written, spot-on follow-up to her "I heart blogs" post and the WHY it's so big too, so click here and get reading.
Once in a while it's good to remember where we all came from, from 1st post, '0' comments and '0' followers! So thank you once again!
Now, to the serious business... Here's a yumtastic recipe for the weekend!
Mint Chocolate Cupcakes by Anna UK, from the Nigella website.
What you need:
| 225g self raising flour |
| 4 tbsp cocoa powder - I added more cocoa as it didn't look chocolaty enough |
| 1 tsp Baking Powder |
| 225g caster sugar |
| 225g unsalted butter |
| 4 eggs |
| 1 tsp mint essence |
| 100g plain choc chips |
| For icing: |
| 115g unsalted butter, softened |
| 225g icing sugar sieved |
| 1 tsp mint essence |
| green food colouring |
| 100g plain choc chips (or use choc sprinkles) - I swapped mine for red hearts! |
Make it!
| 1. | Preheat oven to 160 deg. C. |
| 2. | Place 18 paper cases into muffin tins |
| 3. | In a bowl sieve flour, baking powder and cocoa. |
| 4. | Beat butter and sugar together in another bowl. Add eggs one at a time and beat together. |
| 5. | Add flour mixture gradually. Stir in the mint essence and choc chips. Spoon mixture into cases and bake for about 25 mins. |
| 6. | To make icing, beat icing sugar and butter in a bowl stir in the mint essence, and just enough food colour to turn the icing mint green. |
| 7. | Ice the cooled cupcakes and decorate with choc chips or sprinkles. OK, now it's time to stuff yer face! Yummers! |