Get your St Patrick’s Day bake on with these shamrock cupcakes

St. Patrick's Day is a great excuse to get inventive in the kitchen with the kids.

We love any excuse to get kitsch and creative in the baking department so when we spied these adorable little shamrock cupcakes we had to try them out. Leigh at Easy Cake Decorating had the most ingenious way to shape her cupcakes with marbles. You will need a cupcake tray, cupcake cases and marbles. Ingredients: For the cupcakes: 110g butter, softened 110g caster sugar 110g flour 2 teaspoon baking powder 1/4 teaspoon salt 2 eggs, beaten 1 teaspoon vanilla extract A few drops of green food colouring For the icing: 170g butter, softened 225g icing sugar A few drops of green food colouring To decoarte: Mentos or smarties Directions: 1 Preheat the oven to 180°C. 2 First make the cupcake batter. Using an electric mixer, beat the butter and sugar together until pale and creamy. 3 Sift the flour, the baking powder and salt and beat into the butter mixture. 4 Add the eggs, the vanilla extract and food colouring and mix until just combined. 5 Prepare the muffin tin. Arrange cupcake cases in each hole and then using marbles create a 'Y' shape. 6 Pour the cupcake mix into a freezer bag and snip off the corner to create a piping bag. Carefully pipe the mix into the cases, filling each just halfway to allow them to rise. 7 Bake in the oven for 12-15 minutes, or until risen and firm. 8 While the cupcakes are cooling make the icing. Beat the butter, icing sugar and food colouring together. 9 When the cupcakes have cooled, remove the marbles and tidy up any batter that may have overflowed. Cover with the icing and decorate with Mentos for eyes, or any other sweets you may have.