Peanut Butter & Jelly Cupcakes

Ah, peanut butter. It's a wonderful thing. Good on toast, great with chocolate. Who would have thought, eh?

My love for peanut butter is serious. I try it with everything. So, why not cupcakes, eh?

This cupcake recipe is great, but it does have a more grown up taste, it is not as sweet as other cupcakes. The saltiness from the peanut butter really comes through.

Ingredients  (Makes 12)
Cake
120g self raising flour
120g grams caster sugar
1/4 teaspoon of bicarb of soda
130g unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
2 large eggs
50g peanut butter (smooth or crunchy, depending on which texture you prefer)
12 teaspoons or so of raspberry or strawberry jam
Icing
130g unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
50g peanut butter
360g icing sugar
2 tablespoons milk
Peanut Crumble
30g peanut butter
30g icing sugar

Method

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees, 180 degrees fan, and line a muffin tin with cupcake liners (or baking cups).

In a bowl, mix your flour, sugar and bicarb of soda, before adding the eggs, butter and peanut butter. Whisk together for a minute or so.

Add the milk, combine and then split the mixture into the the cases, until two thirds full. Pop in the oven for 20 mins, or until golden and springy to the touch. Leave to cool on a wire rack.

While your cakes are cooling, it's time to make your peanut crumble. This is a totally optional part, but I love it, and keep any remains of this and sprinkle on popcorn (it's a popcorn game changer!). Get out your food processor, pop in the peanut butter and icing sugar, and blitz up for a minute or so until you see the little crumbs. Now simply pop to one side while you get to making your icing.

Now to make your icing, beat together your butter and peanut butter for a good five minutes with an electric whisk (or by hand), until it starts to look pale. Now add you icing sugar, half first and then when that is combined the other half. Pour in the milk and whisk until everything is combined.

Now, you need to fill your cakes with jam. You can do this many different ways, I have a piping nozzle, but you can cut the centre out and scoop some jam in before popping the cut out cake back on top, or you can poke a hole in the cupcake with the end of a wooden spoon, or a chopstick, widen the hole and pipe some jam in.

Now simply pipe or plop your buttercream on your cakes, followed by a little blob of jam and a sprinkle of the peanut butter crumb, and serve!