A is for Ariel's Treasure Cakes

The Pumpkin Doughnuts we recently made for a Cinderella themed tea party were a hit so I have decided to stick to a good thing and keep devising recipes for foods to suit fairy tales.

Since Cinderella is Bear's first choice of the princesses I let Bee choose which princess we would cook for this time.  Princess Ariel from The Little Mermaid was her decision which meant I had to put my thinking cap on to try and find something suitable.  And that's where these Treasure Cakes came from.

For the cupcakes we used a Sand Cake recipe.  Sand Cake is named for its crumbly texture just like Mud Cake which is also named for its appearance and texture.  However combining the word Sand and cake tends to put people off.  Don't let it put you off this recipe.  Sand Cake has a lovely buttery flavour and is also nice baked in a loaf or ring tin as one larger cake.

To make these cupcakes into treasure cakes we used a similar technique to that of making Butterfly Cakes.  I cut a small circle out of the centre of each cupcake.  We then filled the hole that was left with pink butter cream icing and lollies.  The circle was placed back on top of the cakes to 'hide' the treasure in the 'sand'.

The crumbly nature of the Sand Cakes makes it a bit tricky to neatly cut the circles from the tops of the cupcakes.  But I think the rough edges add to the sand like appearance (well that's my story and I'm sticking to it!).

Bee also wanted to leave some cupcakes whole and put the icing and lollies on top.

We are going to continue with making recipes to suit fairy tales.  Coming up will be a healthy snack for the Princess and the Pea as well as a treat for Peter Pan.

Treasure Cakes
Download a recipe card here.
Makes 12 cupcakes

Ingredients
For the cupcakes
110g butter, softened
110g sugar
2 eggs
110g self raising flour
2 tablespoons cornflour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder

For the icing
125g butter, softened
240g icing sugar
2 tablespoons milk
a few drops of pink food colouring

Directions
To make the cakes
1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius.

2. Line a cupcake tray with paper cases.

3. Beat butter and sugar together.  Don't mix too much as the coarse sugar grains add to the sandy texture.

4. Add eggs and mix well.
5. Mix together the flour, cornflour and baking powder.

6. Mix the flours into the butter mix.

7. Divide the cake batter evenly between the cupcake cases.
8. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes.
9.  Remove cakes from the tray and allow to cool on a cooling rack.

To make the icing
10. Meanwhile make the icing. Using an electric mixer, beat the butter until it is as pale as possible.
11. Beat in half the icing sugar and half the milk.  Repeat with the rest of the icing sugar and milk.
12. Stir in the food colouring.

Finish the treasure cakes 

13. Remove a small circle from the top of each cupcake with a small sharp knife.

14. Pipe or spoon in a little of the pink icing.

15. Add the lolly treasures.

16. Place the cake circles back on top of the icing and lollies to hide the treasures.

Update 1/07/2014
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If you would like to own a copy of The Little Mermaid either in book form or on DVD you can click on the links below to go to my Fishpond Affiliate store.