Bring on the muffins!!

After making the apple crumble at the weekend I remembered that I quite liked this baking malarkey and stomped in to the kitchen to see what took my fancy.

I still hadn't tried anything from my Hummingbird Baking cookbook which I got for the rather bargainous price of £4 (it's about £12 in the shops so saved myself plenty of pennies). Everything in it looks so good and I would love to go and visit the bakery down in the London place but until then I decided to content myself with having a go at some muffins.

I went for the hazelnut & chocolate muffins, which I almost passed by until a quick glance down the list of ingredients revealed just what was in these bad boys. The one and only Nutella!! (Or if you're cheap like me, generic hazelnut and chocolate spread from your local supermarket.)

They came out so well, I was so pleased with myself. They are probably the finest looking muffins I have ever produced. Usually my muffins look like they've been hit by a car or that they've been made with the help of a 3 year old but these were great. Perfect shape and lovely neat icing. I should have got some hazelnuts to decorate the tops with but I was too lazy I'm afraid.
The recipe said it would make 12 cupcakes and a note in the front of the book says that they are based on American cupcake sizes so to use muffin cases. Now I did and I only got 6 muffins. Maybe I have super large cases?! Who knows. Either way it was probably for the best as this way there's only been 6 to scoff instead of 12!

I present to you - Hazelnut and chocolate cupcakes

Ingredients

100g plain flour

20g cocoa powder

140g caster sugar

1.5 tsps baking powder

pinch of salt

40g butter

120ml whole milk

1 egg

6 tbsps of Nutella

(whole, shelled hazelnuts to decorate)

Frosting

175g icing sugar

40g butter

30ml whole milk

80g Nutella

Method

- Preheat overn to 170c

- Put in flour, cocoa powder, sugar, baking powder, salt and butter and beat until everything is combined

- Slowly pour the milk into the mixture, beating well until everything is combined. Add the egg and beat well.

- Spoon mixture into cases until two-thirds full and bake in the oven for about 20 minutes, or until sponge bounces back when touched.

- When the cupcakes are cold, hollow out a small section in the centre of each one and fill with dollop of the Nutella, before placing the top back on (it will stick up a bit but don't worry, it's going to get covered in icing!)

For the frosting:

- Beat icing sugar and butter together (my god be careful, the whole kitchen was covered in icing sugar powder by the time I was finished!). Slowly pour in the milk and continue beating until the frosting is light and fluffy. The longer you beat the lighter and fluffier it becomes.

- Stir in the Nutella by hand until evenly mixed into the frosting. Then spoon over the top and finish with the hazelnuts.

Et voila! Eat to your heart's content!!