Rascally Rabbits! (Cupcake Recipe and Decoration)

This Instructable is for my Rascally Rabbits cupcakes, an idea I came up with a while ago when helping a friend brainstorm cupcake decoration ideas and I finally got around to making them!

For these cupcakes I used the base recipe for Strawberry Chocolaty Cupcakes from the Hamyln 200 Cupcakes book and some simple buttercream icing. The recipe below is enough for 12 large cupcakes and a generous amount of icing for each.

For the Cupcakes you'll need:

75g cocoa powder (I used Bounville to make them extra chocolaty!)
225 ml boiling water
125g lightly salted butter
275g light muscavado sugar
2 eggs
200g plain flour
1 teaspoon baking powder

For the buttercream icing you'll need:

150g unsalted butter
250g icing sugar
50g cocoa powder
3 tablespoons of hot water

For the decorations you'll need:

Grey fondant
Orange fondant
Green fondant
White fondant
3 Cadbury's Flakes
1 small Bournvile bar
Black icing pen
Balsa Wood
Cocktail sticks
PVA Glue

Tools and things:

Cupcake Cases (I used Buffin cases, halfway between a bun and a muffin, also the only ones I could find in brown)
Weighing Scales
Measuring spoons
Mixing bowls
Hand held electric mixer
Metal spoons
Muffin Tin
Wire rack
Cupcake decorating tools (Or cheap kids modeling tools from an art shop)
Parchment paper / grease proof paper
Sharp knife
Piping bag

What I was listening too (I love my baking beats):

CAKE - Comfort Eagle / Fashion Nugget

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Step 1: The Cupcakes

First thing's first, you need a base to decorate. As I said in the intro, I used a recipe from my Hamlyn cupcake book. Because I want my icing and cupcake to look like the soil underneath my rabbits I decided to go for a totally chocolaty recipe! The original idea had carrot cupcakes, but I thought the sweetness of the icing and the fondant would clash with the carrot cake flavour. And of course you can choose your favourite cupcake recipe instead if you'd prefer!

To start the cupcakes, line a muffin tin with 12 large cupcake cases, I chose brown to keep with the soil theme, and put the tray to one side. Set your oven to 180C so it can be preheating while you make your cupcake mix,

Sieve the cocoa powder into a heat proof bowl or jug, and add the boiling water. Whisk until completely smooth, and then leave aside to cool.

Add the muscavado sugar and the butter to a bowl and using an electric mixer, blend together until smooth. Beat the eggs and gradually add them to the sugar and butter, blending again until smooth.

Sieve the flour into the bowl and then using a metal spoon stir it into the mix. Don't forget to add the baking powder here, the book actually forgets to mention it, and I didn't remember it until I was dividing up the mixture.

Add the now cooled cocoa mix and blend. Make sure you scrape around the edges, so there's no pale mixture left.

Divide the mixture as equally as you can among the paper cases and put into the oven for 25 minutes. Remove when firm to the touch but still soft and springy underneath. Place them on a cooling rack in the tray for 10 minutes and then remove them and allow them to cool completely.

Now you have your base for your decoration, you can start on that while these cool!