Gingerbread Man Cupcakes

My previous post explains how I made 60 cupcakes for Jim's birthday and as they were disappearing at an alarming rate he decided to stash some back for his department.

I didnt actually get to eat a single one and I was lamenting this to him. So he brought me one back. A lovely little gingerbread man one.

These were by far the favourites so I thought I would share the recipe etc with you!

The gingerbread recipe makes a serious amount of gingerbread. I've got a sizeable chunk of dough now in my freezer after making the gingerbread men.

Ingredients

Cupcakes

125gr butter

115gr golden caster sugar

2 eggs

10gr dark brown sugar

1tsp ginger powder

1tsp baking powder

125gr self raising flour

12 small chunks of jarred stem ginger (cut into about 1/2cm cubes)

Gingerbread Men

350gr plain flour

2tsp ground ginger

1tsp baking powder

100gr cold butter cut into cubes

175gr soft brown sugar

1 egg

4tbsp golden syrup

1, First make the gingerbread by sifting the dry ingredients together into a bowl and rub in the butter.

2, Add in the sugar and mix well.

3, Add in the eggs and syrup and mix together to form a dough. Wrap in clingfilm and chill in the fridge for an hour.

4, Preheat the oven to 180o/c. Remove from the fridge, lightly dust a worktop with flour and roll out to about 1cm thick. Stamp out gingerbread men with a cutter.

5, Spread out on a lined baking sheet and bake for 5-10minutes until golden. Cool before decorating and use on cupcakes.

6, To make the cupcakes, cream together the butter and two sugars until pale and fluffy.

7, Beat in the eggs

8, Sift in the flour, ground ginger and baking powder and fold in until well combined.

9, Fill cupcake cases with the mixture and poke under the surface of the batter a chunk of ginger

10, Bake for 20-25 minutes at 180o/c until golden and springy to the touch. Cool well before icing.

Ginger Buttercream

115gr soft butter

260 gr icing sugar

1/2tsp or 1tsp ground ginger (depends how gingery you like things)

1, Beat the icing sugar and butter together with the ground ginger until smooth.

2, Using a large star nozzle, pipe swirls on top.

3, Gently sit a gingerbread man on top.