November Cupcake hero

Hi everyone,

As i have said, i am a newcomer to the daring

bakers, and whilst navigating the sites of the

various members, i happened to come across

a post for "The cupcake hero" challenge, run

by the wonderful Quirky cupcake. Seeing as

my nephews were staying over at our house, i

thought i would make them some morning tea

to take to school. So, i was going to bake anyway,

so why not take a shot at the november cupcake

hero challenge of "Cranberry".

Cranberries aren't really in season in Australia, so i used Cranberry jelly and some beautiful dried berries in stead. The berries were a mix of Dried blackberries, cherries and cranberries. I shall call my Cupcakes "Cranberry cupcakes with dried berries and lindt chocolate, topped with Cranberry buttercream and grated lindt chocolate."

They tasted really great! I just kinda improvised alot of it, but everyone seemed to enjoy them. Here is the recipe for your use if you'd like, and some photos taken along the way. Enjoy!!!

Cranberry Cupcakes with Dried berries and lidt chocolate topped with Cranberry buttercream and Grated Lindt

Ingredients:

125g Unsalted butter, softened

125 g Caster sugar

2 eggs

1/2 tspoon vanilla bean paste/ extract

125 g self raising flour

1 tspoon cinnamon

3 tablespoons Cranberry jelly

3 tablespoons Dried berries (rough indication, honestly i just added as much as i thought was good, i didn't measure

50g Lindt (or other) 70% cocoa dark chocolate

2-3 Tablespoons milk

Method:

Cream butter and sugar until fluffy.

Add vanilla extract and blend.

Beat in eggs one at a time,

adding a spoonful of flour between each egg.

Fold in the rest of the flour and the cinammon

a spoonful at a time. Fold in Cranberry Jelly,
dried berries and chocolate chopped up in
small pieces.

Divide mixture evenly amongst 12 cupcake cases.

Bake in a preheated oven at 200 degrees celcius
(that's hot- i'm sorry, i don't know the fahrenheit
conversion, but i think around 400) for 15-20 mins.

Once cooked, remove from tin and leave to cool
entirely on cooling rack before making buttercream.

Ingredients for Cranberry buttercream

3/4 cup Icing sugar sieved

100g butter

2 tablespoons cranberry jelly

small piece Lindt 70% cocoa dark chocolate

* Beat Icing sugar and butter in a bowl until light and fluffy. Add Cranberry jelly and continue to beat for a further 2 minutes. Spread liberally on Cupcakes and garnish with Finely grated dark chocolate. Fell free to add other decoration. If i'd have had cranberries at my disposal, a few fresh cranberries on top would have been nice, but i only had dried, and they aren't that pretty!