October 23, 2017
Ghost Cupcakes!
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Chocolatey and delicious chocolate cupcakes topped with an italian meringue to make cute and spooky ghost cupcakes for Halloween!
Halloween baking
So Halloween is well an truly upon us now. It’s really not that far away any more, and its the perfect excuse to make anything ‘spooky’! Lets be honest though, its not spooky at all but they’re still mini little ghosts and I will call the cute and spooky.
After the successes of my Halloween drip cake and pumpkin spice cupcakes, I thought I should do some other Halloween baked goodies and these were too good to resist.
When searching through Pinterest, there were so many cute little bits on ghosts, I wanted to do something ghost themed! I wasn’t too sure how, but meringues seemed best. As I didn’t want to have to toast/torch the meringue so that it would stay brilliantly white, I went for an italian meringue.
Cupcakes
I went for a simple chocolate cupcake using a 100% cocoa powder and it made the cupcakes a really dark and beautiful colour. In my mind, it made it more spooky and it made them taste DELIGHTFUL! The contrast between the cupcakes and the meringue makes the ghosts seem even whiter!
- Butter – you can use baking spread, or room temperature unsalted butter – both work well
- Sugar – I love using light brown soft sugar in my chocolate cupcakes, but caster sugar is always good
- Eggs – I use medium eggs, so I use three
- Flour – self raising flour as always, because you need the raising agent for a fluffy cupcake
- Cocoa powder – as mentioned above, the darker the cocoa powder the better
Italian meringue
This italian meringue recipe is the same as the one I used in my no-bake lemon meringue cheesecake as it’s just such a delicious and beautiful meringue. It is a tad complicated for some people, and it does require a sugar thermometer and some confidence, but if you pull it off it’s wonderful. The amazing part of using an italian meringue is that it doesn’t need to be browned off at all, as its already baked/cooked through the sugar syrup.
- Sugar – I always use white granulated sugar for Italian meringue, I find it works best, and it’s also cheap
- Water – it’s important to accurately measure this, you can weigh the water in grams to make it perfect
- Egg whites – I find it best to use actual eggs, compared to the cartoned egg whites you can buy as sometimes they can fail. It’s about 3 medium eggs worth
Cupcake decorating
You can use black baking cases like I have below or you can use some baking cups if you would prefer. ! I would recommend using large piping bags with a large round nozzle to get your desired ghost shape – I tend to pipe directly downwards for the meringue, and lift up. Then I pipe down again for a smaller blob on top for the ghost shape
For the eyes and mouth, I genuinely just melt some chocolate and then pipe carefully onto the meringue at the end. My little ghosts are what you could call unique , and quite frankly, they still taste good whether they’re perfect looking or not. Some of my chocolate dribbled a bit, some went down right wrong. Some of my meringues look a tad funky, but I’m pretty content with the fact that you can tell they’re ghosts!
Tips & Tricks
- I use these black cupcake cases for the recipes
- I use these large piping bags for this recipe
- I used this large round nozzle for this recipe
- I use this cookie scoop for portioning the cupcake mix
- I use this thermometer for the meringue to make it easier
- These cupcakes are best on the day of decorating, but do last for 2-3 days in the fridge (this may dry out the sponges)
- You can freeze the cupcake sponges for 3+ months
Ghost Cupcakes!
Ingredients
Chocolate Cupcakes
- 150 g unsalted butter
- 150 g light brown sugar
- 125 g self raising flour
- 25 g cocoa powder
- 3 medium eggs
Italian Meringue Topping
- 185 g granulated sugar
- 85 ml water
- 100 g egg whites
- Melted dark chocolate
Instructions
For the Cupcakes
- Heat your oven to 180ºc/160ºc fan and line a cupcake/muffin tin with 12 large cupcakes cases/muffin cases
- Beat the butter with the light brown sugar until light and fluffy
- Add the eggs, self-raising flour and cocoa powder with the butter/sugar mix until well combined
- Spoon the mix into the cupcake cases evenly and bake in the oven for 15-20 minutes or until a skewer poked into one of the cakes comes out clean and they are springy to touch – leave them to cool fully on a wire rack.
For the Italian Meringue
- Pour the sugar and the water into a heavy-based saucepan and bring to boil, stir it occasionally with a wooden spoon. When the mixture starts to boil monitor the temperature until it reaches 120ºC (firm ball stage) with a sugar thermometer!
- When the mixture is heating up and boiling, if any sugar splashes up the side of the pan, brush the sides with a pastry brush and cold water to get rid of it – this will stop the mixture crystallising and messing up!
- Whilst the mixture is starting to get towards the temperature whisk the egg whites in your electric stand mixer! When the sugar syrup has reached the temperature and the egg whites are at stiff peaks start to pour the sugar syrup onto the egg whites at the edge of the bowl whilst still whisking – make sure you do this slowly so its a constant trickle of sugar syrup so that the egg whites stay smooth!
- Continue to whisk throughout whilst the sugar syrup is pouring in, and after its all whisked in continue to whisk the mixture fast and on a high speed for 5-7 minutes until the mixture is smooth, and has cooled down.
- To decorate the cupcakes – In a large disposable piping bag with a large round nozzle and pipe the meringue onto the cupcakes in little ghost shapes. It’s sometimes best to practice a couple separately first! I pipe the meringue on by pointing the nozzle downwards till it creates a bottom, then lift slightly. Then, I repeat again with a slightly smaller blob and lift to create a thin top!
- I then pipe on the tiniest little amount of dark chocolate to create eyes and a mouth but you could use fondant easily as well! Enjoy!
Notes
- I use these black cupcake cases for the recipes
- I use these large piping bags for this recipe
- I used this large round nozzle for this recipe
- I use this cookie scoop for portioning the cupcake mix
- I use this thermometer for the meringue to make it easier
- These cupcakes are best on the day of decorating, but do last for 2-3 days in the fridge (this may dry out the sponges)
- You can freeze the cupcake sponges for 3+ months
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Hiya I am in the process of making them right now, I did the boiling of the water and sugar and I let it cool down by accident as I was looking at the wrong temperature I just reheated it but when I began to pour the mix it had crystallised at the bottom and I got some in my egg white mix. It is currently mixing now will it still work and be ok to eat?
Hi, when attempting to make these as soon as we added the sugar mixture to the egg white it turned orange/brown and was wondering how you kept it white
Just made these for Halloween, great recipe really easy to follow. I think I messed up my italian meringue though, not nearly as soft as yours more marshmallowy! Would this be if over whisked the egg whites at the start? Or can it be over whisked once it’s all combined? Love your recipes, have made some amazing things which I get a lot of high praise for so thank you!
Hey! How do you know it’s softer? This meringue if made correctly is just like any meringue and holds itself completely (such as when you hold a bowl over your head) – as long as that’s the case, then the meringue was done correctly! As you whisk the Italian meringue for quite a long time, it would be hard to over whisk it!