Time for the bun-ting as fairy cakes cast their spell in the kitchen

GET the bun-ting out, the Queen's Platinum Jubilee is just around the corner!

The easiest to make, and perhaps also the most joyous, of cakes is the fairy cake – the queen of the tea table!

Somewhere around the turn of the century the good old fairy cake, like some arterially leavened red squirrel, became the victim of an alien invasion from across the pond. I refer, of course, to the dreaded cupcake. With these overgrown, snazzier US counterparts – piled high with tooth-achingly sugary icing – how could our dainty little native fairy cakes hope to compete?

Of course, there are those who would argue that the two are basically one cake divided by language. Have those people ever tried to finish a red velvet cupcake artificially coloured, unashamedly vulgar and absolutely irresistible? I'm keen to protect our fairy cake of childhood parties alongside iced gems and crisps, decorated with water-icing and a smattering of hundreds and thousands, where sponge was always the star and not ''frosting''.

To this end, I've dusted off my bun tins and dug deep to find my paper cases, and mugged up on a traditional recipe from the 1970s where the basic formula seems straightforward enough; roughly equal amounts of butter, sugar and flour, plus egg and a little milk to loosen the mixture.

We can also blame most recently that American instalment of the third series of Sex and the City in which Carrie and Miranda discussed their crush over pink-iced vanilla cupcakes which inspired bakeries across the world to make them. Our very own Nigella is rarely one to miss a trend, although she somehow always dodges the bandwagon, but she did embrace the cupcake fever back in the eighties when her book had a cherry cupcake on the cover ­– starting the day with a cupcake was definitely OK if she said so!

Don't get me going on those multi-coloured cupcakes with an appetite for a flamboyant sugar trip, being the Dame Ednas of the cupcake world. But be warned, if you are orchestrating some hastily-made street party buns for your jubilee parties, they will bring a lump to your neighbours' throats if not washed down with a glass of wine!

RECIPE

JUBILEE BUNS

Makes 12 assorted buns

Ingredients:

100g/4oz unsalted butter, softened

100g/4oz caster sugar

100g/4oz self-raising flour, sieved

2 eggs, beaten

A little milk might be needed to slacken the batter

Buttercream recipe:

50g/2oz unsalted butter, softened

75g/3oz icing sugar, sieved

Beat well until smooth

Method:

1. Place 12 paper cases into a bun or muffin tin then preheat your oven to 180c/160c fan/Gas Mark 4.

2. Place all the ingredients into a mixing bowl and whisk or beat well until light, smooth and creamy without lumps or sugar granules. Add a little milk if the mixture feels a little stiff.

3. Divide the mixture into your 12 bun cases.

4. Bake for 12-15 minutes or until your buns are well risen and golden brown.

5. Transfer onto a cooling wire to cool before decorating your buns as desired.

6. Butterfly buns can be made by slicing the tops off each cake and filling the cavities with a little jam and buttercream, then cut each sliced top in half and arrange on top of the filling to resemble butterfly wings, dust over with a little icing sugar.