White Chocolate and Star Anise Cupcakes

 

 

These white chocolate and star anise cupcakes are an unusual flavour combination and quite delicate; it was fun to try something a bit different for the Dr. Oetker Great Chocolate Bake competition. As I mentioned before, Dr. Oetker sent mea few products to use in my baking and I used the white chocolate in these cupcakes.

I got the recipe from Baking Mad but I didn't realise until half way through that despite calling these cupcakes white chocolate and star anise, there was no sign of white chocolate (or any other kind of chocolate) in either the recipe or the ingredients list! So this is how I made them.

 

You need:

for the cakes:

4 star anise

200ml milk

115g butter

150g caster sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

170g self-raising flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

3 eggs

 

For the frosting:

500g icing sugar

160g butter

50ml milk

		Preheat the oven to 180C. First infuse the milk with the star anise, which has a flavour akin to liquorice. Heat the milk in a saucepan with the star anise until just simmering then remove from the heat and leave to infuse for half an hour or more. (Apologies for the formatting - please scroll down).

 

 

Cream the butter and sugar then beat in the eggs and vanilla extract. Next, fold in the flour and the baking powder. Remove the star anise from the milk and gradually beat in the milk until you have a smooth batter.

Spoon into cupcake cases and bake for 20-25 minutes.

Remove from the oven and leave to cool.

I used some 26% Fine Cooks' Chocolate that Dr. Oetker sent me in the frosting for these cakes.

I also used some Dr. Oetker silver shimmer spray on the star anise that I used to decorate the cupcakes, but I found they did not hold the colour particularly well.

To make the frosting, melt the white chocolate in the microwave. Cream the butter and icing sugar, add the milk and the white chocolate and spread or pipe on top of the cupcakes. Top with a whole star anise.