Banana cupcakes with a surprise

This weekend I planned on completing two baking projects, however due to a combination of some nicer weather and a bit of procrastination I only completed one. You may or may not be aware that it is the Oreo cookie's 100th birthday this year. As such I have been seeing a lot of recipes popping up with this delicious cookie, which by the way looks great for its age, as a key ingredient. So of course I had to get in on the act as well. Although, I was a little bit disappointed at the lack of Oreo cookie varieties available at my local supermarkets. I settled on the original Oreo cookie, which was the easiest decision to make as I struggled to decide on how I would like to incorporate it into a recipe. 

I finally selected a Martha Stewart banana cupcake recipe that can be found here, which did not actually have Oreo cookies as an ingredient. To rectify this, I placed an Oreo cookie at the bottom of each cupcake liner and hoped that it wouldn't rise as the cupcake baked.

When it came to the frosting, I figured that I had made enough of it by now to roughly know what to combine to create a batch without consulting a recipe. I used the following:

• 1 cup butter, softened
• 2 & 1/2 cups icing sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla essence
• 1 tsp honey

I chopped up the butter and whipped it for about thirty seconds before I added the vanilla essence and honey. The icing sugar was added a little bit at a time to avoid a snowstorm on the counter top. Once it was all combined I whipped it for a further minute.

With all the flavours already involved in this baking project, I probably didn't need anymore, but I couldn't resist. Once I had frosted the cupcakes using my Wilton M1 decorating tip, I added a sprinkling of white chocolate chips (leftover from my raspberry white chocolate scones) and Skor toffee bits. 

This was one of my most enjoyable baking projects on a Sunday afternoon so far. I am hoping it is inching me closer to the goal of creating my own original and delicious recipe.