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Gingerbread Christmas Cupcakes
These elegant Christmas Cupcakes are a moist chocolate gingerbread cake, topped with a dark chocolate ganache and decorated with festive redcurrants. During the festive season, I think these Christmas Cupcakes are perfect for an afternoon tea with friends or even as a portable cake to bring to school or work.
These Christmas Cupcakes also hold a special place for me because I made them for my son’s first Christmas. Not that he would remember because he was barely a month old at the time, but I remember thinking that I was too sleep-deprived to attempt anything ambitious at Christmas, yet I turned to this recipe as I knew it was totally achievable, no matter your state of mind.
Christmas Cupcake Recipe
This Christmas Cupcake recipe is adapted from one of my favourite cookbooks, How to Be a Domestic Goddess by Nigella Lawson. In fact, I have a post-it note on this recipe from 2001! That’s how long I have been making these wonderful cupcakes at Christmas. And this note tells me to skip the instant royal icing and to instead make a chocolate ganache and decorate with redcurrants.
The original recipe calls for the cake to be decorated with white royal icing and decorated with holly made from green ready-to-roll icing. If I recall correctly, I could not find such ready-to-roll icing in Australia, which is probably why I resorted to using a chocolate ganache.
And this is how I have made these Christmas Cupcakes all of these years since I first bought this cookbook.
Tips for Making Christmas Cupcakes
My kids love these lightly spiced cupcakes, but if you plan to make this recipe primarily for kids, I would suggest making the chocolate ganache with milk chocolate – dark chocolate ganache is not as sweet and can taste bitter to children, although adults love it!
If you can’t find redcurrants in December, raspberries also work well.
And whilst berries make these cupcakes look very elegant, you could replace them with Christmas sprinkles or similar.
Christmas Cupcakes
Ingredients
For the Cupcakes
- 125 ml (½ cup) water
- 75 g (2 ½ oz) dark chocolate, 70% cocoa
- 1 teaspoon instant coffee powder
- 150 g (1 cup) plain flour, all-purpose flour
- 5 g (1 teaspoon) baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon mixed spice
- pinch fine salt
- 2 eggs
- 3 tablespoons sour cream
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 100 g (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
- 160 g (1 cup) dark muscovado sugar, or dark brown sugar, or light muscovado sugar
For the Chocolate Ganache
- 100 ml (⅓ cup plus 1 tablespoon) double cream
- 125 g (4 ½ oz) dark chocolate, 60% or 70% cocoa
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
To Decorate
- fresh redcurrants, raspberries or Christmas sprinkles
Instructions
For the Cupcakes
- Preheat the oven to 200°C/392°F (without fan).
- Preheat a metal tray in the middle shelf of the oven.
- Place the water, chocolate and instant coffee in a small saucepan.
- Heat the saucepan until the chocolate starts to melt.
- Take the saucepan off the heat.
- Whisk the mixture until the chocolate has fully melted and the liquid mixture is smooth.
- Set aside to cool slightly while you get on with the rest of the recipe.
- Measure the flour, baking powder, baking soda, mixed spice and salt into a large bowl.
- In a small jug, whisk together the eggs, sour cream and vanilla.
- Place the butter and sugar into a large mixing bowl or the bowl of an electric stand mixer.
- Cream the butter and sugar until it is light and fluffy.
- Add the egg mixture.
- Slowly beat in the flour mixture, one tablespoon at a time.
- Keep beating the batter until everything is well incorporated and smooth.
- Line a 12-hole cupcake/muffin pan with paper cases.
- Divide the batter between the paper cases.
- Bake the cupcakes for 15-20 minutes, or until a skewer inserted in the middle of the cakes comes out clean.
- Leave the cupcakes in the pan for about 5 minutes, before removing them to cool completely on a wire rack.
For the Chocolate Ganache
- In a small saucepan over low-medium heat, gently warm the cream, chocolate and vanilla.
- Once you see the chocolate start to melt, remove the saucepan from the heat.
- Use a whisk to mix everything together.
- If there are still solid pieces of chocolate, return the saucepan to the heat until all of the chocolate has melted, whisking continuously.
- Once you have a smooth and thick mixture, the ganache is ready.
- Set the saucepan aside for the mixture to cool slightly. The ganache will thicken as it cools, but you want to use it while it is still warm.
To Decorate the Cupcakes
- Dollop a generous teaspoon of warm ganache onto a cupcake.
- Decorate with some redcurrants.
- Repeat for all of the cupcakes.
Kitchen Notes
- MAKE IT KID-FRIENDLY
Kids love chocolate gingerbread cakes, but I would recommend making a milk chocolate ganache using chocolate with 50-60% cocoa content. - LIGHT VS DARK BROWN SUGAR
This recipes uses either light brown sugar or dark brown sugar. Both will produce a similar taste, but dark brown sugar will yield darker-coloured cupcakes. - RECIPE CREDIT
This recipe is inspired by Nigella Lawson‘s recipe for Christmas Cupcakes from How to be a Domestic Goddess. - OVEN & STOVE TEMPERATURES
All recipes on this website have been tested on an induction stove and/or with a conventional oven (i.e. an oven without fan). All recipes on this website use temperatures for a conventional oven, unless otherwise mentioned. Convection ovens (i.e. fan-forced ovens) are typically 20°C/70°F hotter than conventional ovens, but please check your manufacturer’s handbook. - CONVERSIONS
To convert from cups to grams, and vice-versa, please see this handy Conversion Chart for Basic Ingredients.
Wow I remember this recipe too from Nigella’s first baking book! That was a lifetime ago and I used to make it often with the fondant icing. I love your take on this with the chocolate ganache. Thanks for reminding me of this recipe – I am definitely making it very soon!
Hi Emma,
Ha ha! Glad to have reminded you of this wonderful recipe 🙂