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Masterchef has a lot to answer for – my 8 year old’s homework this week was baking cupcakes! I realise that all schools are very proud of ex-students that go on to achieve a modicum of fame, but surely trying to prepare them for an appearance on reality TV is pushing it a bit too far. What next? Practicing hanging around the house all day doing nothing and calling it “Training for Big Brother”?

But then I realised that this was in fact a great opportunity. I could spend some quality time with my daughter, impress the school with my hands-on approach to parenting and also satiate the cravings of my sweet tooth by enjoying the fruits of my labour after Amelie had been sent off to bed! That’s not a win/win situation….. it’s a win/win/win! And if truth be told, both Amelie, my 8 year old, and I quite enjoyed ourselves doing some baking.

To make 12 cupcakes, you will need….

• 90g self-raising flour
• 90g caster sugar
• 90g soft margarine
• 2 eggs
• ½ teaspoon vanilla essence

 And for the icing and decorations, you will need….

• 175g icing sugar
• 1 ½ tablespoons of warm water
• Food dye (Colours of your choice. We used green, pink and blue).
• Whatever you want to decorate the cupcakes with. We used strawberries, blueberries, whipped cream, M&Ms, chocolate buttons, chocolate drops, 100s & 1000s

Firstly, turn the oven on to 190 degrees. Whilst it is heating up, put a paper cake case in each muffin tray hole (or bun tray depending on what you have).

Then sift the flour into a large bowl and add the sugar, margarine, vanilla essence and the eggs. Mix everything until smooth and creamy. Amelie said that she “stirred until my hand was aching”.

Divide the mixture equally between the 12 cupcake cases and pop them in the oven for 15 minutes.

Once the 15 minutes are up, remove from the oven, let them cool for a couple of minutes, and then place the cakes onto a wire tray to cool further.

Now time for the icing. For white icing, add the warm water to the 175g of icing sugar and mix in a bowl until you get a smooth paste. For coloured icing, just add a couple of drops of the appropriate food dye.

Use a warm teaspoon to ice the cupkcakes. (And keep dipping it in warm water to stop it getting sticky and to allow you to smooth the cupcake well. But don’t put too much icing on as your decorating will start to slide down the side of the case before setting).

Now the really fun part and definitely Amelie’s favourite bit; adding decorations. This is the bit where you can let your creative side run wild. Add whipped cream, fresh fruit, chocolate buttons or anything else that takes your fancy. And as this was Amelie’s school homework, she had freedom of the kitchen and the pantry to add anything she could find.

The end result was actually very good. The cupcakes were exceedingly tasty and I managed to only eat a couple of them by the time Amelie got up the next morning to take them to school! Amelie was rightly very proud of her efforts, and as she carried them in to school she seemed to be walking just that little bit taller than normal.