Miss four wanted to make some princess cupcakes. We made some pear cupcakes based on this recipe, to help use up the oodles of pears from our pear trees. Ideally I would have printed out the princesses for the top of the cakes, but we are stuck at home under Covid-19 lock-down without access to a printer. Therefore, please forgive my complete lack of artistic talent.
Ingredients:
Pear cupcakes:
125 g butter, softened
2/3 cup sugar
2 free range eggs
2 cup self-raising flour
2/3 cup milk
2 pears, peeled, cored and grated
Lemon butter icing:
50 g butter, softened
1 1/2 cups icing sugar
Juice of 1 lemon
Food colouring
Things you will need:
pale coloured card
a printer OR more artistic talent than me
coloured pens or pencils for colouring in
Instructions:
Pear cupcakes:
Preheat the oven to 180°C (356°F). Place cupcake liners into a 12 hole muffin pan.
In a food processor, beat together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the free range eggs one at a time. Add the grated pears. We change the food processor attachment to a grater and feed in the pears on top of the other wet ingredients.
Sift the flour into a separate bowl and add the milk and all of the wet ingredients. Fold the ingredients together until combined. Fill 12 cupcake liners with mixture and bake at 180°C (356°F) for 25 minutes or until cupcakes spring back when touched.
These cupcakes are great to eat just on their own and freeze well.
Lemon butter icing:
Combine butter, icing sugar and food colouring in the food processor. Mix until combined. Add lemon juice until the icing is of a good piping consistency. I made the icing a bit to thin on this occasion, so I recommend adding the lemon juice gradually. Pipe on top of the cupcakes using a long narrow piping tip.
Princesses: Thanks to the lack a printer and Covid-19 lock-down, I attempted to draw some Disney princesses. I am afraid that drawing is not one of my talents. My four year old then coloured them in.
What the kids can do:
Hand washing: Don’t forget to get the kids (and grownups too of course) to wash their hands before you start. Little hands always seem to end up touching everything, including the ingredients. This is extra important given the current Covid-19 situation. For good 20 second hand wash, have them sing “happy birthday to me” twice.
Eggs: Pro tip for breaking eggs with a 4 year old, break eggs into a separate glass bowl before adding to your other ingredients. That way you can see and pick out any bits of shell before they are added in by mistake. I like to use free range eggs, because it is kinder to the chickens, and they also taste better. Bear in mind that raw eggs can carry Salmonella so wash little hands if they end up the raw egg. I also don’t recommend eating raw cake batter, just in case.
Mixing the ingredients: My daughter (age 4) helped mix all the ingredients in the food processor. Bear in mind that little hands can fit down the shoot of the food processor, so always supervise this step. Miss four had a go at pealing the pears (being careful of fingers!), then I finished the pealing and cored the pears. My daughter then cut the pears up with a butter knife (for safety) and fed them into the food processor for grating.
The biggest messes seen to happen when sifting and mixing dry ingredients with the kids. A great tip from reader Dana M is to put a towel down underneath, which catches any stray ingredients for easy cleaning. When fold wet into dry ingredients, you want to mix thoroughly, but not too much or the cupcakes will go flat, this usually requires the grown up to either finish off the mixing and/or intervene before things are mixed too much.
Princesses: I asked my four year old if she wanted to draw the princesses, she said I should do it, because I know how to draw princesses. I beg to differ, but attempted to draw Cinderella, Aurora, Elsa, Moana and Belle. Miss four did the colouring in.
Keeping Them Occupied 