Ghost Cupcakes

As usual I am running behind!  I wanted to post these for Halloween.  Nothing like waiting until the last minute!  Ghost Cupcakes - I thought they were adorable.  I got the idea from a picture in Food Network Magazine that a friend brought over.  I made chocolate cupcakes and covered them with chocolate fudge frosting - yum.  I stuck an unwrapped lollipop into the cupcake to hold up the ghost.  Then I used a 4" circle cutter to cut circles out of white fondant for the ghost body.  I had to mold the fondant to get the ghost body to look right.  I used black icing for the eyes and tip number 3.  They were easy to make and really cute!

Happy Halloweeen!  We will be trick or treating tonight with Lightning McQueen and a Blue One Eyed Moster!

S'mores Cupcakes

I wanted to try these cupcakes because I love S'mores and they are so comforting and it is getting cold here!  I used the Perfectly Chocolate Cupcake recipe and made my cupcakes.  I made sure to fill my cupcake liners only half full with the batter.  The cupcakes baked a little over the top of the liner so next time I may try to add even less batter! 

Next up was the Marshmallow Frosting.  I got the recipe from the Glorious Treats Blog.  I made the frosting according to the directions and it did not come out ok!!  My frosting was so thin.  I couldn't pipe it on the cupcakes (see picture).  I just had to spoon it on. 

I hate when something doesn't come out right.  Drives me bonkers!!  I knew what I did wrong.  Directions step 3 - beat the egg white mixture for about 2 minutes.  Well - I am a very literal person and that is exactly what I did.  WRONG!  I needed to make sure the egg whites thickened and became like a meringue.  So I made the frosting a second time.  I put the whisk attachment on my mixer and beat them for a long, long, long time.  I would say over 10 minutes.  The frosting came out better and because I was bringing them to a party I didn't have time to make it a third time.  So I went with it. 

I piped the frosting onto the cupcakes with a 1M tip.  I browned the frosting with my handy dandy kitchen torch.  I am so happy that we have found another use for that thing.  We have had it for 7 years and have maybe used it twice.  Be careful doing this though - it does get hot!  Then we put a piece of graham cracker and hershey bar on each cupake and done! 

Next time I would make sure I beat the egg white mixture on high with my whisk attachment for a long time until they were very thick.  And - I should have followed my own rule of not baking something for the first time when I need to take it somewhere!  I will definately make these again.  Love the marshmallow frosting.

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Tea Party Tuesday

Halloween Cupcakes

I am not sure if you guys are like me, but if you are, you like things that are simple.  I don't have a lot of extra space in my head for complicated recipes.  That is why I have always made my cupcakes, cakes or brownies from a box.  But since I am now on a quest to become a better baker I need to start experimenting with recipes from scratch.  I have made things from scratch before like the Carrot Cake Cupcakes I made a few weeks ago or the Buche de Noel cake I made for Christmas last year (definately one for the blog if I make it again!)  I searched the web and found a recipe for Perfectly Chocolate Cupakes on the Glorious Treats blog and decided to go with them.

The real test with these cupcakes is whether or not I would be able to make them with two toddlers at my feet!  I preheated my oven to 350*F and got to work.  Everything went smoothly and was much easier than I thought.  I filled my muffin pans and popped them in the oven.  The recipe says to fill the liners 2/3 full with batter.  I was using a large measuring cup to pour the batter in and it flowed fast.  I think most of my cupcakes were a little more than 2/3 full.  That resulted in a larger cupcake top then I would have liked - see photos below.

Once they were cooled I frosted them with my favorite buttercream recipe, which I will post at some point (if you want it now leave a comment and I can email it to you.)  I wanted a white/orange striped look for the frosting so before I filled my piping bag I used a toothpick to line each seam of the bag with orange gel food coloring.  Then carefully filled the bag with frosting and was on my way.  Another great tip from Glorious Treats!! 

I have to say this experience of baking from scratch was great.  It was a lot easier than I thought and I know I will be doing a lot more of it in the future!!

Jack-O-Lantern Cake Pops

In the spirit of Halloween and our trip to the pumpkin patch I decided to make Jack-O-Lantern cake pops.  I have made cake pops one other time and they came out pretty good (no pictures of them - darn!) so I thought these would be a breeze.  And they aren't that hard, but there are a lot of steps and in-between the steps you need to chill the cake pops so it can be time consuming.
I made my cake, let it cool and crumbled it into pieces with my hands.  I looked at Bakerella's blog for inspiration.  I don't want mine to be too gooey so for one cake I used 1/2 cup of frosting which is Wilton's recipe.  I mixed the frosting in with my hands and rolled them into cake pops.  It is like rolling meatballs!  The neat thing is that you really can do any shape, think - ghosts or train - whatever!  After you roll them they must go into the fridge for a couple of hours.  When you take them out you are ready to insert the lollipop stick.  Dip your lollipop stick into melted candy - color of your choice, I used orange- and insert stick half way into cake pop.  Make sure you  use the same color for the stick as you are going to use for the pop.  Then back in the refrigerator for at least 15 minutes until the candy has set.

Next dip the cake pop into your melted candy.  Here is where I had trouble!  You can melt your candy in the microwave according to the package directions or using a double boiler.  I chose microwave - anything to save time!!  My problem - I burnt my candy first time around.  I kept thinking it wasn't melting and would put it in again.  When you overheat the candy it gets really thick.  YUCK!  I had to throw it out and start over.  The trick is to really, really stir the candy between each microwave trip.  I got the candy right and dipped my pops.  Once you dip you can gently tap the pop against the side of the bowl to remove excess candy.  Then back in the fridge!

Now that my pops are covered in orange candy and chilled I can decorate.  I used green icing to add the pumpkin stem and black food coloring to draw the faces on.  Let me tell you - the food coloring is really hard to use as paint!!  I wanted to use an edible pen but only needed black and didn't want to buy the five pack of pens so figured I could just use food coloring - Wrong!!  The pen would have been much better and that is what I will use next time.

So lessons learned from Jack-O-Lantern cake pops - 1.  Don't overheat your candy melts!!  2.  Buy the right tools, in this case the edible pens!

Cake pops definately catch my interest.  They are so versatile.  I am sure you will see them again.  And the most important thing??  Very tasty!!