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Buckwheat Butterfly Cupcakes

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Buckwheat Butterfly Cupcakes

My super cute buckwheat butterfly cupcakes are moist nutty and a surprise of sweetness with every bite. Buckwheat flour is naturally gluten free. This recipe was inspired by the traditional northern Italian cake, called Torta di Granosaraceno (Buckwheat Cake).

I first tasted this cake when I was holidaying in the South Tyrol area of Italy. We walked up a small mountain and the restaurant (known as Hoff's) at the top had this gluten-free cake on their menu. Being a lover of buckwheat and nutty style cakes this was a cake I thought I would enjoy. After the first bite, it was perfectly moist, nutty, not over the top with sweetness or icing. Traditionally baked in a round tin and cut through the centre to add lingonberry jam between the layers.     I reimagined this cake to be bite-size cupcakes with the flavours of the traditional cake but made into fun butterfly cupcakes.

My first attempt to bake this cake I followed the traditional shape and adding raspberry jam to the centre as I knew that lingonberry jam would be difficult to buy in the UK.

When I wanted to reinvent this recipe and I dreamt up the butterfly idea. I played around with different flavours inside. Dark chocolate spread and orange marmalade was the winner. A little removed from the original idea but it works so well with the flavours in the cake. I don't like cream so we haven't included cream under the butterfly wings.

NB. If you want to make the original larger round cake double the recipe and bake for 40mins in a 23cm springform ring pan.

Ingredients

  • Butter – 125g (1/2 cup)
  • Castor Sugar - 125g  (1 cup)
  • Eggs (separated) - 3
  • Buckwheat flour – 125g  (1 cup)
  • Ground Almonds – 125g
  • Grated Apple – 1/2 (approx 1/4-1/2 cup)
  • Vanilla Extract – 1 tsp
  • Filling Inside Butterfly – Raspberry  or Marmalade Jam or Nutella – 1/2 tsp jam
  • Icing Sugar – 1 tsp

Method

  1. PRE-HEAT oven to 180˚C or 160º fan
  2. BUTTER or line a 12 muffin tray
  3. CREAM the butter and then add the sugar and whip till fluffy
  4. ADD teaspoon vanilla
  5. SEPARATE the eggs and break the whites into a medium bowl and set aside to use later
  6. BEAT in egg yolks into the mixture until creamy
  7. ADD grated apple.
  8. COMBINE – almonds and buckwheat flour and whisk together then add to the mixture
  9. BEAT in a separate bowl the egg whites until soft peaks are formed
  10. FOLD in the egg whites until combined. This mixture is rather thick.
  11. SCOOP using an ice-cream scoop or spoon into your prepared tray and smooth over the top
  12. BAKE – for 20 mins. They should be cooked in the centre – check with a cake skewer
  13. COOL for at least 30 minutes before removing from the muffin tray
  14. COOL for an extra 1-2 hours before cutting the wings and filling
  15. BUTTERFLY WINGS – cut a small circle and scoop out the cake, fill the hole with 1/2-1 tsp of jam and or chocolate spread like Nutella. Cut the cake circle in half to make the wings. Place the  straight side of the wing half into the jam and sprinkle or dust with icing sugar.