Gloverly Cupcakes

In case you missed it, the Great British Bake Off started again last week! Becky and I both really enjoyed trying the technical challenges last year so we’ve decided we’ll be doing them again this year. Last year we took it in turns to make them each week but we both decided we wanted to try the technical challenge from cake week – When I printed off the recipe I was surprised to see that it used a packet of orange jelly. I’d assumed that they’d had to make their own but re-watching the episode it turned out that they did in fact use a packet of jelly! I planned on making my own but I had a busy weekend so decided to just buy a packet. Adding the orange zest definitely helped enhance the orange flavour. I made a double batch – I decided that after making a batch of 12, and sampling a few (they’re so moreish!) there wouldn’t be many for Tom to take to work. I only had one bun tin so I made the two batches separately. When I spooned the mixture into the tin at the start I was slightly worried that they looked too full and would spill over the top. However, I used up all the mixture and crossed my fingers. I watched them as they kept rising but luckily they didn’t spill over the sides and rose perfectly. The trickiest part of this recipe was covering them in chocolate. If the chocolate is too hot then it melts the jelly and slides off/runs down the sides. If it’s too cold it sets before you have time to spread it out/make the criss-cross pattern on top. After the first few that looked a bit messy, I managed to get it to the right temperature. I also used a fork to start off with to make the criss-cross but the prongs were too fat and they didn’t look right. In the end I used a piece of florist wire and made several lines one way, and then the other way.

I would definitely recommend giving these a go (recipe here) – they are quick to make and fairly simple (especially if you’re not fussed about getting them to look perfect!).