Happy Valentine’s Day my lovelies!

I hope you’re all having a wonderful day, and feeling the love. Remember, you don’t have to have a significant other, or multiple admirers to feel validated today. Take the time to go out with your friends for a drink or some dinner. Or spend the evening in and pamper. I find that there are very few things that pep me up, as much as a face mask, good scrub down, glass of wine and some choccie will.

I’m lucky enough that Hubs and I are off for a delicious dinner tonight. It’s only our second Valentine’s Day together, but our first one as a married couple, so it’s extra special for us. I’m looking forward to sitting down and maybe sharing a bottle of wine.

VALENTINE'S DAY CUPCAKES

I love sharing the love with EVERYONE on Valentine’s Day, so I whipped up a batch of delicious cupcakes for my office. I went with a regular vanilla cupcake, and went a little more fancy for the icing. I did a buttercream, then added some cream cheese in to make it a little richer. Then I added some Flavour Nation White Chocolate flavour drops. WOWZERS – it tastes like there is real white chocolate in the icing! I baked them in red cupcake wrappers, and added some heart shaped sprinkles and big red icing flowers.

VALENTINE'S DAY CUPCAKES

VANILLA CUPCAKES

(makes between 12 and 24 cupcakes)

Ingredients:

400g white sugar

4 eggs

300g flour

250ml milk

175ml oil

2 & 1/2 tsp baking powder (makes them extra fluffy)

2 tsp vanilla essence

Method:

Preheat oven to 180°C. Line cupcake pans with paper cupcake cases.

Beat sugar & eggs for about 1 minute, until slightly thickened.

Add milk, oil, vanilla, flour & baking powder, & beat for another minute, until batter is smooth & creamy (do not overbeat).

Fill cupcakes cases until they’re 2/3rds full of batter.

Bake for 8-10 minutes, or until golden.

Buttercream and Cream Cheese Icing:

I didn’t make this with a recipe. I just added a couple of tablespoons of butter and half a bag of icing sugar into a mixer and beat for a couple of minutes. I then added a couple of tablespoons of cream cheese and beat until smooth. When I was happy with the consistency (it had to be thick enough to pipe onto the cupcakes), I added 10 drops of Flavour Nation White Chocolate flavouring.

VALENTINE'S DAY CUPCAKES