In a large bowl whisk together the flour, cocoa, salt, baking powder and baking soda.
Cream the butter and sugar together in a medium bowl.
Add the eggs one at a time making sure to mix thoroughly. Mix in the sour cream, vanilla and milk.
While mixing on low speed add the wet ingredients to the dry and mix until just combined.
Scoop the batter into cupcake papers filling 2/3 the way up. Bake at 350 for 20-25 minutes or until the centers are springy to the touch.
For the Buttercream
In a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, cream the room temperature butter until smooth.
Sift in the confectioner’s sugar. You can add the sugar in two batches. Beat until you get to a thick consistency. Add the vanilla extract.
Reserve a small amount of buttercream in a bowl. Add more confectioners sugar and mix by hand until you get a play dough consistency. This will be used for the base of your flowers.
Split the rest of the buttercream into 2 batches. Dye one batch brown and the other pink.
Put brown buttercream into a piping bag fitted to a 47 tip.
Put pink buttercream into a piping bag fitted to a 120 tip or a curved petal tip.
For the Assembly
For the Basket Handles;
Fold brown food coloring into the fondant until the desired color is reached. It should match the brown buttercream.
Roll out the brown fondant to 1/4-inch. Each strand should be about 5-inches long.
Twist two of the strands together to create the handle. Cut the ends with a knife for clean ends. Allow to dry overnight.
For the Buttercream Roses;
Cut out 1-inch squares of parchment paper to use as a piping base for each flower.
Mold a tiny amount of the play dough type buttercream into a cone and place it on the middle of the parchment paper square.
Using the pink buttercream, start to pipe small petals around the cone. Start small and gradually go a bit bigger until you have your flower.
For the Assembly
Once your cupcakes have cooled, remove them from the cupcake papers.
With the brown buttercream, use a basketweave technique to pipe the basket around the side of the cupcakes.
Dye the shredded coconut green by adding coconut flakes and a few drops of green food coloring to a sealable plastic bag. Mix together and place on top of cupcake for the grass.
Arrange the buttercream roses and chocolate candy eggs on top.
Carefully stick your basket handle into the cupcake.
Notes
Definitely make the handles in advance. 1-2 days ahead is fine! They really need to set.
This looks really cute with just the eggs in so go ahead and skip the buttercream roses if you're short on time.
You can make a bigger version of this with a two layer 4 inch cake!
Matching the fondant color to you buttercream can be a challenge. The easiest solution is a WHITE Easter basket!
Practice the basket weave pattern on a plate first if you haven't don it. It's an easy technique but it's better to work on the cupcakes once you're confident.
If you don't have sour cream then plain yogurt will work just fine.