Parma Violet Cupcake Recipe and Give Away

A dear friend of mine asked me to make her mum some cupcakes for her birthday.
When her mum was a little girl her favourite sweets were Parma Violets, so I was on a mission to recreate this sweet subtle flavour for her birthday cupcakes.

After a bit of investigation on the internet, I found that you can purchase Violet  Extract for cooking, however I could not get hold of this in time.
So my plan was simple.
Buy some Parma Violets, crush them in a pestle and mortar, add them to the icing sugar for the butter cream and voilà, Parma Violet flavoured cupcakes.

Recipe

Ingredients: Makes 12


The Cupcakes

4 oz plain flour
5 oz caster sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons of baking powder
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1 1/2 Oz unsalted butter or baking margarine
1 egg
 

The Frosting

4 oz white cake margarine/ butter
9 oz icing/confectioners sugar

5-6 Large Pkts Parma Violet sweets (12 mini packets)

 Preheat oven to 170 C / 325 F/ Gas Mark 3

The Cupcakes

Sift flour and baking powder into bowl. Sift in sugar and add room temperature butter.
Beat with electric hand mix or free standing mixer on slow until all ingredients are combined.
Break egg into separate bowl and beat, then add to batter and mix until all ingredients are combined, making sure you scrape the sides of the bowl with a spatula.
Place mixture in cases (I use an ice cream scoop, so all cakes are even). Bake in the preheated oven for 20-25 minutes until cooked.
Remove from oven and leave to cool on a wire rack.

Whilst cooling, take your Parma violet sweets and pop them into your pestle and mortar. Crush them to a fine dust, making sure there are no large pieces left.

The Frosting

Combine icing sugar and cake margarine in your mixer/bowl. Using a paddle, beat until the frosting is all combined. Turn the speed down to slow and carefully add the Parma violet powder until it is all combined.

Then dye your frosting if you wish. I used Wiltons gel food dye in purple. I add just a little at a time using a cocktail stick, until desired colour is reached. I chose a pale pastel shade, however you can make it as deep as you feel.

Once the frosting is finished, spoon some out on to each cooled cupcake and spread with a spatula or knife. Alternatively, you could pipe the frosting into swirls.

I found these cupcakes to be a real delight and am now hoping to recreate a lot of Sweetie flavoured cupcakes, any suggestions?

The give Away.

I am going to give a way a set of Cupcake toppers like the ones shown in the picture.

There will be 12 full toppers and 12 flags to match.

You simply, stick these toppers into the top of your cupcake for an instant decoration.

All you have to do to enter is leave a comment on my facebook page under this blogs title post, saying what your favourite childhood sweets are or were.

You have until Friday evening to leave your comments and then I will use random selector to choose the lucky winner.

I have to give all photo credits to my daughter Jasmine once again and also the credit for styling the shoot.

She arranged the backdrop, props and decorations and photographed the whole thing, thank you Jasmine x

Hope you like them

love

Natty xxxxx