Case #5: He’s-No-Angel Case of Identity Cupcakes

 

Mrs. Hudson does not normally have the temerity to disagree with Mr. Holmes about his cases. I’m sure I know my place as his landlady. However, the conclusion of A Case of Identity didn’t sit right with me. What, not tell a woman that her lover is really her stepfather trying to cheat her out of her money? How awful! Mr. Holmes made some excuse about a woman’s “delusions” as if that made it alright. We women are romantic creatures, it’s true, but when faced with the truth I'd say we can accept it as well as any man and better than some.

Well, nothing left to do but bake about it now. This is not a fancy recipe, but you can have fun with it by playing a little game with your guests.

The ironic alias "Hosmer Angel" makes me think of Angel Food Cake, and since Mr. James Windibank turned out to be a devil in disguise, we should have Devil's Food Cake, too. For this recipe, you need to bake a batch of each in opaque cupcake liners and frost them so that the two varieties look identical. Anyone selecting one of these cupcakes will get a surprise flavour--a much nicer surprise than finding out that your soft-spoken suitor is your mother's husband! 

When I served these cupcakes upstairs at 221B, Mr. Holmes acted like distinguishing between the two varieties was no mystery to him. So typical of his conceit. Then, when he chose an angel food cupcake, he had to pretend to be delighted with it, even though I happen to know he's devoted to chocolate. 

It's not a lot towards getting Miss Sutherland a bit of her own back, but it's something.

The Cupcakes

Make a batch of angel food cupcakes and devil's food cupcakes. You can either bake them from scratch using a standard recipes, or take advantage of modern convenience foods, like Mrs. Beeton's line of cake mixes. 

Mrs. Hudson decided to make it easy on herself this time.

It's important to use opaque liners for the cupcakes so that the different colours of the cake batter don't show through. Metallic liners are ideal for this, or use any dark shade of paper liner. In the first photo you can see that I also added a second liner at the end, which gave a pretty, layered effect.

The cupcakes prior to the final frosting disguise

The Frosting

The cupcakes are frosted with a buttercream frosting tinted purple in an homage to the lovely dress Miss Sutherland wore to the Gasfitters' Ball. 

Frosting ingredients 

1 cup Butter 

4 cups Icing Sugar

3 tbsp Cream

2 tsp Vanilla Extract

Pinch of salt

Food colouring 

Mix together the butter and icing sugar, then add in the rest of the ingredients and whip until the mixture is smooth and fluffy. You could spread the icing on the cupcakes with a knife, but piping gives a more consistent coverage which will make it harder to see the cakes underneath. 

Which would you choose?