Chocolate Easter Cupcakes with Ganache

Happy Easter everyone from me and my egg shaped body.

This time last year we had a lovely BBQ in our garden with our friends. We had homemade Wiggy burgers, lots of booze, the weather was glorious, I got locked in the hallway for 20 minutes, happy days. This Easter Sunday we were supposed to be having family over for lunch who we have not seen since Christmas. We had planned the menu, bought flowers, bought chocolates for a mini egg hunt, talked about possibly going to the Bethnal Green toy Museum and bought face paints and modeling clay for the children. It was going to be a lovely day.

Unfortunately, our guests are not coming now. Sometimes you have to admit defeat and accept that some people will never be prepared to listen to you even if they are related to you. What a difference a year makes in more ways than one.

Anyway, I'm determined not to let this disappointment ruin the weekend. After a couple of weeks working again I have been too tired to write any blogs and too busy to do anything worth writing about, but I think things may be about to quieten down again. Last week was quite knackering being on a shoot and also The Wig was in Edinburgh on another shoot which I did not like at all. The only bonus of him being away was the duty free treats I received on his return home. What a kind and generous Wig he is.

I found it very hard being on my own which is odd as its never really bothered me before. The first night alone was the worst as at 3am I heard what I thought was someone ringing the door bell. After several sweaty moments in bed realising I didn't have a weapon nearby to beat an intruder with (and actually couldn't get up out of bed very easily or quickly), I worked out that it wasn't the door bell, but the chime on the clock in the front room that The Wig had wound before he left . . .  So on the one hand last week was hard but as Ronan Keating once said 'Life is a roller coaster' and as it had its low points it also had a very high, high point. Finally after 1 year and 11 months (may as well call it 2 years) of wrangling, emailing, form filling, house meetings and general hair pulling, we finally got the completed paperwork through to confirm that we own the Freehold of our flat and have extended our individual lease to 999 years. For anyone that owns a leasehold property you will know this is pretty excellent news albeit a total mind boggle, but it also means that we can now either sell the flat or rent it out. Yipppeeee! Its a been a long road to get to this point with a lot of other things happening in conjunction with sorting it out. Since I started the process almost 2 years ago, I quit my job after 7 years, went Freelance, planned a wedding, got pregnant, postponed a wedding so there's been a lot going on all at once. What a busy time we've had. Which I'm sure is about to get a whole lot busier.

So hopefully after the baby is born we will be in a good position to move somewhere bigger, I can't wait. But just as I think there is no more room here to squeeze anything in, I always manage to to find another little space for 'stuff'.

Cushion from Rose + Grey for my rocking chair.

Victorian Milking Stool from eBay. Not quite sure why or what its for, I just liked it.

Wooden crates from Nelly Pepper for putting baby bum cleaning supplies in.

To make 12 x Chocolate Easter Cupcakes with Ganache:

To make the cupcakes2 Eggs

200g Caster Sugar

130g Plain Flour

50g Cocoa Powder

2 Teaspoon Baking Powder

A Pinch of salt

160ml Milk

1/4 tsp Vanilla Essence

160g Melted Butter

For the topping

2 x Cadbury's Flakes, crumbled

1 x Bag of Mini Eggs

2 x 100g bars of minimum 70% good quality Chocolate broken into chunks

200ml of Double Cream

* Pre-heat oven to 170 degrees celsius (fan oven).

* Whisk the eggs with sugar together.

* Sift the flour, baking powder, cocoa powder and salt into the egg and sugar mixture.

* In a jug, measure out the milk and vanilla essence. Stir and pour into the dry ingredients, then mix well.

* Pour the mixture into 12 x cup cake cases.

* Cook for 30 minutes.

* When cooked, transfer to cooling rack and make the ganache.

* Put the cream in a pan and slowly bring to boiling point. When heated, pour over the chocolate

chunks and stir until dissolved.

* When thoroughly mixed, pour on the top of the cakes, make a nest shape with the crumbled flake and pop a few eggs on top.

Happy Easter!