Here at Craft Gin Club, we not only adore drinking gin - we also love baking with it! Inspired by the flavours of one of our favourite cocktails, the Pink Lady, we’ve come up with these super-pretty - and delicious - cupcakes. Made from light and fluffy lemon sponge and topped with a delicious pink gin and raspberry butter icing, they’re the perfect (cocktail) party showstopper!

Pink gin, raspberry & lemon cupcakes

For the cupcakes:

125g of softened butter
125g of caster sugar
2 medium eggs
100g of self raising flour
2 tbsp of milk
2 lemons

For the icing:

175g butter
350g icing sugar, sifted
1 tbsp pink gin (or to taste)
Few drops of pink food colouring or raspberry liqueur

For the raspberry gin drizzle (optional):

1 punnet of raspberries
3 tbsp caster sugar
2 tbsp gin

Heat the oven to 180 degrees. Beat together the butter and the sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs, flour, milk, the zest of the two lemons and a squeeze of lemon juice, then mix until smooth. Spoon your mixture into cake cases and bake for 10-15 mins.

While the cakes are cooking, make your butter icing by mixing together all the ingredients until smooth. Wait until the cakes have completely cooled before decorating them with the icing - you can either pipe it from a bag or use the back of a flat knife to spread the icing over the cupcakes.

Optional:
To make the raspberry drizzle, put a handful of raspberries, sugar and gin in a small pan and add just enough water to cover all the fruit. Simmer over a low heat, stirring gently with a wooden spoon, until all the fruit has broken down, the sugar has dissolved, the alcohol burnt off, and you’re left with a delicious thick and sticky syrup.

If it’s too runny, keep simmering until you have the consistency you need; if it’s too thick, just add a little more water (or gin!) until it is runny enough to drizzle over your cooled cupcakes. Once you’ve got the right consistency, strain the syrup through a sieve to get rid of any pips.

Drizzle your raspberry syrup over the iced cupcakes and top with a single raspberry.

Like this? You might also enjoy:

• Boozy strawberry, gin and elderflower sponge cake

• Gin-soaked carrot cake

• Gin, pink pepper and grapefruit drizzle cake