a blazin' birthday

I was asked to create some fire truck-themed cupcakes for a 2 year old boy's birthday party! To make it more interesting I created a story in the cake with a blazing fire in the centre of the cupcake layout with a forrest, hydrants and fire hoses surrounding the blaze and finally the fire trucks coming to the rescue. My predicament was coming up with a fun fire truck decoration - do I 'draw' the truck on with icing, or find some candy to create the engine? At the last moment I found licorice chews - bite-size thick squares of licorice! These were the foundation of my fire trucks with mini m&m's for the wheels. The cupcakes were chocolate and vanilla flavoured, and from what I hear, were a success!

it's beginning to look a lot like...

Christmas north pole cupcakes!

Here's an idea for a holiday cupcake treat: Chocolate peppermint cupcakes with a candy-cane swirl! If you can, look for those pretty edible silver and gold balls, they're great for holiday decorating, and no, they won't break your teeth. Other holiday ingredients you can add to your cupcakes are ginger, apple-spice, pumpkin, egg nog...I'm going to experiment with an egg nog cupcake this week by just substituting egg nog for the liquid required for a cake mix and a pinch more cinnamon and nutmeg. A nice ganache of whipped cream, icing sugar and a splash of baileys/rum/rum flavouring would be a great way to celebrate the holidays.

yum.

EEEEE-ARGGGGH!

Ay Matey! These pirate-themed cakes were created for a co-worker of mine for a Halloween party. After doing some 'research' I came up with these fun designs - I did a google image search and found quite a lot of cakes pirate-style! I used red sprinkles, mini m&m's, and silver balls for the decorations. What flavour of cakes would compliment a pirate-themed party? RUM of course! (non-alcoholic rum flavouring - find it in your grocer's baking section) :)

pumpkin~patch~cakes

This was a fun and easy design: simply ice your cupcake, dip into orange sprinkles, use a toothpick to make some indentations in your pumpkin and then pipe some icing in the indents to create the grooves. You can use green licorice for the stems or ice them on too! There's a quick youtube video about how to create these cupcakes here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCvFGsHkoRw

To make pumpkin flavoured cupcakes follow the directions on a spice/yellow/white cake mix box, add 1 can pumpkin, an extra egg and sub buttermilk in for the water. Then add your pumpkin pie spice: cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger and allspice. The result is an aromatic, light and fluffy cake reminiscent of pumpkin pie :)

fire up the ovens!!

for some gingerbread cupcakes! I made these cupcakes along with some peppermint chocolate ones for a Peet's Coffee and Tea Holiday meeting (featuring seasonal drinks such as the gingerbread latte and peppermint mocha). Once again, following the cupcake wisdom of my 'Hello Cupcake' book, I made a pseudo-homemade batch up cupcakes using a yellow cake mix, 4 eggs, buttermilk in place of water, a bit of molasses (about 1/4 to 1/2 cup), and a bunch of ginger. You can alter the spiciness of your cupcakes with the amount of ginger you add. I made a batch of cream cheese frosting, piped some on each one using a large circle icing tip and then sprinkled some yellow sugar on top! I also topped them off with a ginger snap wedge. *However, you should add the wedge just before serving your cupcakes because as I found, the cookies go soft in the fridge and when they stay out for too long.* When it comes together, it's really all about the cream cheese frosting. yum. :)

rock-a-bye-baby cupcakes

These cutie cakes were gobbled up today at a baby shower for a friend of mine. I made a scrumptious white chocolate raspberry cake recipe with raspberry buttercream icing. I've tried a few buttercream icing recipes and I think this is the best and easiest one to make that doesn't taste like you're eating a stick of butter:

Easy Buttercream Icing

1/2 cup unsalted butter

2 cups icing sugar

1 tsp vanilla

1-2 tbsp milk

Mix together and add more or less liquid for desired consistency :)

Where did I get the inspiration for these cakes you might ask? My new fav cupcake book: "Hello Cupcake!" This book is a great resource and has some really fun ideas. Some thought the blankets over the babies were made of fondant - not so!!! Just microwave starburst candies for 4 seconds and then roll them out and mold them! I give two thumbs up for the creative inspiration of "Hello Cupcake!"

my cupcake debut...

October 1. 150 cupcakes. San Francisco. Caribbean-theme.

After a couple afternoons of non-stop baking and decorating, these little babies left their home and went out into the great beyond - downtown San Francisco! This was an adventure indeed which included a moment of panic when we had to think of a quick solution to prevent toppling cupcakes in the cooler as they were being transported.

***HINT: If you are transporting cupcakes, fill up extra space in your cupcake container with marshmallows! They're flexible, cheap and at the end of the day still edible! I went to Target and bought a few stackable organizer containers that I used to transport the cakes - these worked great, and the marshmallows that filled in leftover space kept the cupcakes from toppling over and mushing into each other :)

Just got word today that the event was a success and the cupcakes a hit! Here's a picture of some of the cakes before they were gobbled up!

A great foundational recipe to build your cupcakes on!

I think it's a good idea to have a simple 'foundational' recipe for your own cupcake emporium. I found a great yellow cupcake recipe in the 'The New Best Recipe' book. I played around with this recipe adding different flavours and spices, orange zest, p.b. and j, chocolate chips, you can add about anything you want to! So here it is:

Yellow Cupcakes

1 1/2 c. unbleached, all purpose flour

1 c. sugar

1 1/2 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. salt

8 tbsp. (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened

1/2 c. sour cream

1 large egg, plus 2 large egg yolks at room temperature

1 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Line a muffin tin with paper or foil liners.

Whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt in the bowl of a standing mixer. Add the butter, sour cream, egg, yolks, and vanilla and beat the wet ingredients into the dry at medium speed until smooth and satiny, about 30 seconds. Scrape down the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula and stir by hand until smooth and no flour pockets remain.

Divide the batter evenly among the cups of the prepared tin using a 2 ounce ice cream scoop or a spoon. Bake until the cupcake tops are pale gold and a toothpick or skewer inserted into the center comes out clean, 20 to 24 minutes. Use a skewer or paring knife to lift the cupcakes from the tin and transfer to a wire rack; cool the cupcakes to room temperature, about 45 minutes. Yield: 12

taken from 'The New Best Recipe; All New Edition.' By the editors of Cook's Illustrated.

it's almost time for some pumpkin pie...

Pumpkin is sooooo yummy. Autumn is probably my favourite season just because all the pumpkin, squash and gourdness comes out. For my pumpkin cupcakes I used a vanilla batter and just added some pumpkin pie spice which gave it a nice subtle flavour of everyone's fav pie. I topped it off with some buttercream icing - using meringue, sugar and butter - and made it look like a dollop of creme fouette! A few pumpkin seeds finished this little cake off. Now, for flavour and texture, the cake was nice, but I wanted to experiment with using actual pumpkin - I tried this and found that the cake was a lot more moist, a lot more pumpkin-y but I still liked the taste of the other cake maybe slightly better. The use of real pumpkin made the cake a little too fragile and moist, but still yummy...hmmm it's a toss up.

mmm toasted coconut!

What is yummier than a creamy coconut cupcake? A creamy coconut cupcake with buttercream icing, toasted coconut and cashews on top! YUM! I took a standard vanilla cupcake recipe, added some coconut to the batter and then topped it off with more coconut goodness. This time 'round I experimented with a different buttercream icing recipe which definitely uses a LOT more butter than my other recipe which used mostly vegetable shortening (for a stiffer icing). This icing combines meringue, butter and vanilla seeds which makes for a very decadent cupcake topper. First I used a double boiler and dissolved the sugar in the egg whites. Then I meringued them up with an electric mixer and added some butter pieces one by one until the consistency was smooth and creamy. However, the icing does get soft quickly so I popped the cakes into the fridge after icing each one - this set the icing nicely. I made a variety of cupcakes using this standard vanilla cupcake recipe by simply adding different ingredients to set them apart. Coming soon...orange creamsicle cupcakes. Double yum :P

Experimental Time!

I've got a bit of time before the Caribbean cakes are baked so I've decided to devote my time to finding a few stellar recipes - light and fluffy cakes. I wanted to find a good mocha cupcake recipe, so, following a chocolate recipe, I simply added a couple tsp. of finely ground Costa Rica Peet's coffee. Upon tasting these mini mochas I found them to be very rich and bold! However, the coffee dried them out too much and after a day or two they were hard, dry and gross! Mind you, you probably shouldn't keep cupcakes after a day or two on the counter and expect them to retain their freshness. So I'm off to find another recipe or alter the one I tried by adding less coffee and maybe whip up some egg whites instead of using the yolks to make them lighter. It was fun to decorate my mocha cups! Chocolate and vanilla buttercream icing topped my cakes along with some marshmallows, caffe latte jelly belly's and just a sprinkle of cinnamon. yummm!

my first cupcake gig!!

Caribbean-themed cupcakes!! For an open house in the big city I'm creating 100 under-the-sea tropical treats - coconut cupcakes and buttercream icing, mmmm. I'm making little fish, starfish, palm trees, hibiscus and frangipani flowers out of royal icing and then painting them with food colouring to adorn my little cakes.

my cupcake emporium begins...

I don't have much to 'blog' about other than that I've decided to start my own cupcake business provoked out of numerous rejections from museums where my education came from, that and a B.A. in fine art. I have always loved to bake due to my overly sensitive sweet tooth and I'm a natural born artiste due to the genetics passed to me from my mumsy and opa and maybe a distant ancestor like Lady Jane Grey who as it turns out may possibly be related to my British heritage side. Anyway, all this to say that I ordered a Wilton cake decorating set and got to work with the 53 pieces creating mushy melting rose globules and then progressing to firmer more rosy roses - check out the evolution of my icing creations :)