Lovely Little Ladybugs!

Omigosh I am so excited I was actually able to make these!  I've been wondering for some time now why people bother to use fondant and gumpaste for cakes, cupcakes and cookies.  I mean, they look beautiful, but you can't eat them despite the fact they are edible.  You can eat fondant, but it's not tasty.  So what's the point?  Then I made the Minnie Mouse Cupcakes and it was so much fun...I started to get it.  It's about channeling your inner elementary art student days and being creative.  You can make anything you want!

Now, I've never been terribly good at art - drawing, sculpture, visualizing - so I'm going to start with only the most elementary designs.  Like a ladybug.  How can you screw that up?

I began by making a batch of strawberry cupcakes.  I used a box mix and added a package of vanilla pudding and used 1 cup of milk instead of water to make it a bit tastier.  While they cooled I began shaping the ladybugs using gumpaste.

Gumpaste becomes hard pretty quickly and is very sticky, so you can use Vegetable Oil to help keep your hands free of gummy residue and to keep the gumpaste pliable.  Rub some on your hands and coat your work surface before handling the gumpaste. I used it quite generously with no negative effects of the design.  Using smallish amounts of gumpaste at a time, work some coloring into the paste using your hands.  I didn't use gloves and the dye made a mess of red all over my hands, but it washed right off.  I used Wilton No-Taste Red gel dye.  I could not photograph this process since I didn't want my camera to be covered in red!

Next, I made odd oval shapes in different sizes.  I worked some black dye into a separate ball of gumpaste and then used it to make the heads and dots, as in the photo above.

Then it was time to mix up some buttercream.

Buttercream Icing

2 sticks butter, room temperature

4 cups confectioners sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 tablespoons milk


In large mixing bowl, beat butter on high speed until fluffy.  Add three cups of sugar, one at a time until combined.  Add vanilla extract and milk, along with last cup of sugar.   Beat until smooth.  Add more milk, one teaspoon at a time, to reach desired consistency of frosting.


I removed about 3/4 of the icing from the bowl and mixed green dye into it to make the "grass".  I used a Wilton Tip #233.  To make the grass, squeeze the icing in the piping bag gently and lift up as you stop squeezing.  After covering the cupcake completely with grass, place the ladybugs randomly on top.

I divided the remaining 1/4 of icing and split it into 2 bowls.  One I dyed yellow, the other light purple.  I used a Wilton Tip #2D. Before piping the flower on top of the cupcake, I made a few practice flowers to get a sense of the pressure to use and just how it worked in general.

Once I felt I had the hang of it,  I piped some flowers randomly on the cupcake and used tweezers to add one white dragee in the center of each flower.

And then the last step - adding a white picket fence around my little ladybug garden.  I picked up some cupcake wrappers I found at my local Michaels Craft Store:

And Voila!!

I honestly think it's so amazing you can go from a simple, plain cupcake to something so special and cute!

I'm pretty excited to try some new sculpture and other avenues of decoration I have resisted.  I'm not sure what I'm going to try next, but the sky is the limit!!!  Happy Spring.  :)

Spring Cupcakes with Two-Color Swirl Icing Tutorial

My last post came about from my need for something 

bright and cheery to offer relief from the constant rainy gloom.  It must have worked because the sun finally came out!  However, it's still freezing outside, so I'm going to try and will the temperatures to rise with another spring inspired treat.  :)

Since experimenting with color swirl icing by painting the icing bag and layering several colors at once to the piping bag, I've been wanting to try a third method I'd read about - using several piping bags filled with different colors fitted into one bag with one tip.  Does that sound a little complex?  It's not.  Check it out:

In two separate piping bags, fill with the colors you've chosen, careful to leave plenty of empty space at the top, as shown above.  Snip the ends  off about an inch high.

In a third empty piping bag, fit with your piping tip.  Make sure you cut the bag high enough  that the entire tip design is outside of the bag.  Don't cut so far above the design tip that it will pop out from the pressure of piping.  You can also use a coupler.

Place the two bags filled with icing on top of each other.  Very gently press them flat, as shown in the photo above.  Make sure the icing reaches the snipped edge of the bag, but don't press so firmly the icing will squeeze out.   Also,  leave empty space in the top of the bag to allow for twisting of the bag once inside the empty bag.

Gently slide the icing filled bags into the empty bag fitted with the  piping tip.  Hold the  empty bag upright when sliding the icing bags in and slowly shake up and down until both icing bags are inside of the tip.  You may need to remove the icing bags and start over if both of them don't reach the tip.  Once the bags are both snuggly sitting inside the tip, twist the top of the bag tightly to prevent icing from coming out of the ends when piping onto your cupcakes or cake.

Once you have placed the icing bags into the piping bag fitted with the tip, test to make sure both colors  pipe out.  Do this by squeezing gently but firmly with consistent pressure.  If only one color pipes out, that means both bags are not inside the piping tip so only one color is able to pipe out.  You will need to repeat the process of placing the icing bags into the empty bag with the piping tip.

And that's all there is to it!  It actually takes longer to read the steps than to do them.  I only had two glitches in my first attempt:  Initially, I did not cut the tips of the bags high enough, so the tip was partially covered and the icing didn't squeeze out evenly since it was blocked.  Also, I didn't flatten the bags at first, which resulted in only one bag reaching the piping tip so only one color came out.  Because it was not coming out of the bottom, the pressure of squeezing the icing from the second bag squeezed out of the top and made a mess!  So, snip about and inch off of the color filled bags, and flatten them.  The rest is a breeze.  I am looking forward to mixing it up with more than two colors at a time.  Of the three methods of multi-colored icing, this is my favorite.  The colors don't change from mixing together and there is plenty of color, not mostly white.  Here are examples of all three for comparison:

Swirl achieved by painting piping bag.

Swirl achieved by layering several colors on top of eachother in one bag.

Swirl achieved by two separate bags of color placed in one bag.

I'm glad I gave each method a try.  I think they can all be used nicely in different situations.  I tend to be a person who likes the last thing I tried best, which could be the reason I'm so fond of #3 at the moment!  Actually, though, I think I like the clean look it offers.  With the pink/white icing in the second photo the color mix worked out nicely.  With several different colors not of the same shade, the mixing can really change the colors, as in this photo:

The original icing colors I used were neon green, neon yellow, neon blue and neon pink.

Whatever way you choose to create icing color swirls they will look great.  Isn't it nice to have options?!  Until next time, here are my photo offerings to spring, sun, and warmth - my baked good version of a rain dance!!

Something To Turn My Frown Upside Down - Pink Rainbow Cupcakes

Oh, so it's been a tough couple of days baking!  Sometimes it happens that I have a stretch of bad luck and recipes that don't turn out.  It can be a bit maddening, but I know it's part of the process of learning and trying new things.  There's are a few recipes I'm very practiced at, ones that turn out perfect every time.  I can continue to make those, or I can choose to challenge myself.  So, chin up!  Smile!  Keep baking!

Now can I admit I made something today that I knew would turn out just fine to make myself feel a little better?  It can be just our secret!  ;)

I made a Valentine's Day version of Rainbow Cupcakes.  So have a lot of other people, and theirs look better, but they made me happy.  I love pink and working with pinks and reds makes me smile.  

Scratch Vanilla Cupcakes

from Martha Stewart

3 cups all-purpose flour

1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

3/4 teaspoon salt

12 tablespoons (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter at room temperature

1 1/2 cups sugar

4 large eggs

2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

1 1/4 cups milk

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Line cupcake pan with liners; set aside.  In a medium mixing bowl whisk together flour, baking powder and salt.  In a large mixing bowl cream together butter and sugar until fluffy.  Add eggs, one at a time,  mixing until incorporated.  Scrape down sides of bowl and mix in vanilla.

Add flour and milk alternately, beginning and ending with flour.  Scrape down sides of bowl.  Add whole raspberries to batter and use mixer to incorporate.  The berries will break up into pieces but will not alter the color of the batter.

Divide batter evenly among liners, filling each about 2/3 full.  

Bake until cake springs back, approximately 18-20 minutes.  After removing pan from over place on wire rack to cool for 5 minutes.  Remove cupcakes from pan and let cool completely on rack.

After mixing up the batter, I split it into four equal parts, dyeing each portion into different shades of pink.  Using the Rainbow Cake/Cupcake technique (click here to see) I filled the liners, careful not to go over 2/3 full.  If you are overzealous filling the liners you will end up with this:

Not ideal.  Not pretty!

While the cupcakes are cooling, mix up the buttercream:

Vanilla Buttercream Icing

2 sticks of butter

4 cups of confectioner's sugar, sifted

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

3-5 tablespoons half and half

Using a mixer, beat butter until it is fluffy.  Add 3 cups of sugar - one cup at a time - mixing until it's completely incorporated.  Add vanilla and half and half along with last cup of sugar and mix, adding more half and half until the icing is the desired consistency.

I split the buttercream into four bowls and added the gel dye in the same colors of the cupcake.  When she was done mixing, I spooned a small amount of each color, one on top of the other, into a pastry bag.  When the cupcakes were COMPLETELY cooled, I piped on the buttercream.

Having one of the three recipes I made work out gave me a boost to try, try again.  Sometimes that's just what you have to do.  I would not have posted these since they're kind of redundant for my blog.  But, it's Valentine's Day tomorrow and probably the last pink treat for awhile.  Time to go green for St. Patrick's Day...I'm donating 150 items to a fundraiser so I'll be making lots of fun stuff!

Happy Valentine's Day!!

Frog and Lamb Cupcakes

Just before leaving for our trip to India, my family celebrated my twin nieces 5th birthday.  Since they were very small, Abigail has loved frogs and Madeline loves her lambs.  So, I wanted to create fun birthday treats for them.  While browsing on Pinterest (if you haven't signed up for Pinterest yet, you should!  It's a virtual pinboard filled with ideas and inspiration for just about anything you can think of!)

Many times on Pinterest you can find how-to's or recipes but in this instance, I had to work off the photos alone.  These did not appear to be too complicated so I gave them a go!

To begin, I made Funfetti cupcakes for the girls.  I baked them as directed.

While they were cooling, I started to make the froggy eyes and lamb heads.  The original picture of the frog eyes looked to be sliced marshmallows and chocolate chips.  I wanted a deeper black eye dot and cleaner circles, so I went with white chocolate wafers and black cake gel.    I used the flat part of the chocolate wafer to add the black dot, as you can see in the photo below.  While the gel was setting I started working with pre-made black fondant, which I purchased at Michaels craft store.  This was my first time working with fondant, and I didn't see a need to try making homemade since no one eats it anyway.  At least no one I know does.  So, bought it and was surprised at how it had a liquidy film around it and how and messy it was!  At first I assumed it was a bad batch, or too old, or something wrong.  However, as I worked it all together with my hands it became firmer and drier.  Once this was done I made nice round ball shapes and flattened them out  to add the eyes, as in the photo below:

Once I was done I referenced the lamb cupcake picture I was working from and saw that a flattened ball was completely the wrong shape!  I needed to make a much smaller OVAL shape and add tiny ears, as in the photo below:

I never follow the first rule in baking....ALWAYS read the entire recipe first (or in this case, double check the photo you are following).  Save yourself the trouble and wasted time!  I share this mistake of mine with you as a cautionary tale!

Once the lamb heads were done, I melted some white chocolate in a squeeze bottle.  I wanted to add small white dots to make eyes on the fondant shapes.  Be warned that if you try to do this immediately after melting the chocolate it will be extremely runny and you will not have control over how much comes out.  A mess will ensue.  Again, a firsthand cautionary tale.

To finish the eyes, I used the same black gel I used for the frog eyes to dot the white chocolate.  Then, I took the top of the chocolate squeeze bottle (after removing it from the bottle and rinsing the chocolate off) to make two indents for a nose shape.

I mixed up two batches of buttercream icing.  From the first batch I put aside a few spoonfuls to dye red for the frog mouth.  I dyed the remaining icing a deep green.  Just green alone wasn't achieving the shade I wanted, so I added a small bit of blue and then red to the green.  I don't know the exact number of drops I used, I just played around with it until I was happy.  It's important to add one drop at a time, though, so you don't overdo it and ruin the icing color.

Next, I iced the frog cupcakes, trying to make them as smooth as possible.  I took the spoonfuls of icing I set aside and added red gel.  After placing the eyes on the cupcakes, I used a ziploc bag with a corner snipped off to pipe the smile on. They looked adorable!

As for the lamb cupcakes, I filled a piping bag with buttercream icing and used a #4 piping tip, lifting up and down repeatedly on the top of the cupcake to create a "fluffy" effect.  I added the pre-made fondant heads to the iced cupcakes, placing them at a small angle, finishing off by piping a bit more fluff on the top of the head.

The girls and party guests loved them!  Yes, they were cute, but they were also DELICIOUS!

Happy Birthday to two of my favorite girls!!

I have shared this recipe with A Little Nosh for Tastetastic Thursday, a linky party.
It's a great site, head over there to check it out for some great ideas and inspiration!

Peanut Butter Cup/Chocolate Cupcakes: The Flavor of These "Turn It Up to 11"

Today is 11/11/11 so in honor of Nigel Tufnel I wanted to make a cupcake that turns decadence up to 11!  Anyone who has seen "This Is Spinal Tap" will know what I'm referring to.  And if you haven't seen it, you must!  I don't think I stopped laughing the entire movie.  It's an absolute must-see classic!!  But, back to the cupcakes.  These are chocolate cupcakes with a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup on the bottom, with chocolate buttercream icing sprinkled with Reese's Pieces.

I began by making chocolate cake batter.  Next, I unwrapped the peanut butter cups and placed them in the bottom of each cupcakes liner.  Just for fun, I added some Reese's Pieces to three of the cupcakes (without placing a peanut butter cup on the bottom).

After filling each liner with batter I baked the cupcakes as directed.  As they baked, I started the buttercream icing.  I used a recipe by Williams-Sonoma.  It's fantastic and pretty easy.

Quick Chocolate Buttercream Icing

from Williams Sonoma

8 oz. unsweetened chocolate, chopped

6 cups confectioners sugar

2 sticks unsalted butter

6 tablespoons milk, plus more if needed

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1/4 teaspoon salt


Have all of the ingredients at room temperature. 

Put the chocolate in the top pan of a double boiler set over but not touching simmering water in the bottom of the pan.  Stir until the chocolate is melted and smooth.  

Let cool to room temperature.
In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the flat beater, combine the confectioners' sugar, butter,  milk, vanilla and salt and beat on low speed until combined, about 1 minute.

Stop the mixer and scrape down the sides of the bowl.  Increases the speed to medium and beat for 2 minutes, then reduce the speed to low.  Add the chocolate and beat until combined, then increase the speed to medium and beat for 1 minute more.

If the frosting is dry, add more milk, 1 teaspoon at a time until it is creamy but still holds peaks.  Makes about 4 1/2 cups.

Since I was only making 12 cupcakes, I cut all of the ingredient measurements in half to make half the frosting.  It was the perfect amount.  I used a piping bag and large tip to ice the cupcakes.

To garnish the icing, I sprinkled some Reese's Pieces on the top.  It is also nice that they are colored in fall hues, so this is a great time of year to make these!  Here's what they look like cut in half:

How delicious does that peanut butter cup look?!  They say that beauty is on the inside, and there is nothing more beautiful than the marriage of chocolate and peanut butter, as evidenced by looking inside these cupcakes!

As far as the cupcakes that had Reese's Pieces mixed into the batter, well, that didn't go too well.  The Pieces all sunk to the bottom and stuck to the liner.  I don't know how to correct that issue, but maybe there's a clever solution out there.  Anyway, if you like peanut butter and chocolate together (and who doesn't) these chocolate and Reese's cupcakes are the ones for you.

This recipe was featured on:

I shared this recipe on: