Royal Chefs Share Queen Elizabeth-Themed Cupcakes for Her Birthday

• To celebrate Queen Elizabeth's 94th birthday, The Royal Family shared something special with us on social media.
• The cupcake recipe comes from The Royal Pastry Chefs and is chocolate, likely in honor of the Queen's favorite dessert flavor.
• Here's the full history on the Queen's normal birthday celebrations, although much of that has been cancelled this year.

It's a glorious day today, as Queen Elizabeth turns 94 (looking healthy as ever, by the way, if her recent national address is any indication). It's a subdued affair this year because of the coronavirus pandemic—the Queen and Prince Philip are holed up in Windsor for the occasion—but that doesn't mean the day doesn't go by without some form of celebration. In addition to the Royal Family sharing rare private video of the Queen as a youngster, more treats were in store for us. In this case I'm talking about literal treats: Chocolate cupcakes, complete with recipe, from The Royal Pastry Chefs. And they're Queen-themed. Yes, it is as cute as you're imagining.

The full recipe is here, and what's great is that they give you options for buttercream and royal frosting. I mean, you have to go with royal, right? The chefs also provide variations on the recipe, should you want to add different elements to the basic version. It's known that the Queen loves chocolate, particularly dark chocolate, so in my mind this is her fave dessert recipe. The Royal Family Twitter even encouraged us all to make our own creations and tag #royalbakes, which I think may inspire "nailed it" memes (of baking disasters gone horribly wrong) as much as it'll inspire some fabulous creations. 

Oh my God they are so cute. ALSO: I would pay a lot of money to watch the Queen trying to gracefully eat a cupcake (in my experience, it is impossible):

And seriously, someone has ALREADY responded to the thread with cupcakes featuring the Queen's hat. This is not the first time the Royal Family has encouraged us with #royalbakes so I imagine this is a previous creation, but no less amazing for it. Magnificent:

Since group gatherings are still on hold, these glorious confections would make the absolute perfect baking challenge over the weekend.

Guys, let's do it. Let's make some cupcakes and eat them in honor of the Queen.

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