Preheat oven to 180C / 160Fan / 350F / Gas 4 & line 2x 12-hole cupcake tins with 24x foil cupcake wrappers, plus have 1 extra cupcake wrapper ready to use (it doesn’t have to be foil)
In a large bowl, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
Then add the beaten eggs and mix until well combined.
Add the food colouring & vanilla and mix thoroughly.
Sieve the flour, cornflour and cocoa powder in a separate bowl and mix together.
Then add the flour mix and the buttermilk to the wet mixture in three parts, alternating between the two, starting with flour.
In a small jug or cup mix together the vinegar and bicarbonate of soda and then add it to the batter and mix well.
Carefully spoon the batter into the 24x cupcake wrappers until they are ⅔ full and then use the leftover batter to fill the extra wrapper.
Place the 2 tins of cupcakes into the oven on separate shelves along with the extra one and bake for around 20mins or until a toothpick inserted in the centre comes out clean.
Remove from the tins and leave to cool on a wire rack.
Once cool, take the extra cupcake that wasn’t baked in a tin and remove the wrapper and top crust. Then crumble the soft red sponge into a bowl, keeping on crumbling the sponge until they are all small fine crumbs with no big lumps.
For the cream cheese frosting, mix together the softened butter and cream cheese.
Then add the icing sugar and vanilla, mixing together until creamy and lump free.
Pipe or spoon a small amount of frosting onto each of the cupcakes and then finish by sprinkling a small amount of the red sponge crumbs on top.
Notes
Cream cheese frosting should be kept refrigerated or eaten within a few hours, so if you are not able to do this, you can replace the cream cheese frosting for a standard vanilla buttercream (250g Unsalted Butter, 500g Icing Sugar, 5ml Vanilla Extract)
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