Gloverly Cupcakes

Last weekend I told Tom that I’d make something for him to take to hockey. However, just over an hour before he was due to leave I realised I hadn’t made anything. Ooops. So I decided to see if it was possible to bake and decorate some cupcakes in an hour. The answer was yes… just!

Given the time constraints I needed to do something pretty quick so I went with chocolate cupcakes while I decided how to decorate them. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve made chocolate cupcakes, but it’s a lot, so I knew I’d be able to make the mixture and get them in the oven pretty quickly. While they were baking I decided that I’d turn them into Mars bar cupcakes. I was going to fill them with caramel and then top with a Mars bar buttercream. They would have been great, but given that the cupcakes had to cool before I could fill them with caramel and then ice them, I gave up on the caramel idea and just went with a Mars bar cream cheese buttercream.

I melted 3 Mars bars with a dash of milk while the cupcakes were baking and then left it to cool while the cupcakes were cooling down too. I’m not sure that the buttercream was Mars bar-y enough but I only had 3 Mars bars so had to make do with that. If I made it again I’d probably up it to 4, maybe 5. I beat 600g of icing sugar and 100g of softened butter together in my stand mixer until no lumps of butter remained. I then added 250g full fat cream cheese, and beat briefly before pouring in the melted Mars bar mixture. I continued to beat it on a medium speed for a minute or so until it was all combined. I then used a palette knife to spread the buttercream on top and finally sprinkled each one with a bit of grated milk chocolate.