Persimmon Cupcakes with Vanilla Frosting, 12/01

What is a persimmon? Well, it's a funny looking fruit. But I was challenged (ok not really challenged but asked) to make a persimmon cupcake from Art's donation of the ingredient, so I set out to find a recipe. I found one here (and A LOT of other cool recipes, which I will be trying out in the near future!!) that seemed to be pretty reputable. There was orange juice and pumpkin pie spice involved, and while I do have to admit this was not my favorite cupcake, those who KNEW persimmons and what they should taste like were satisfied with the flavor. One review was that it "tasted like winter" which I guess is good because persimmons seem to only be ripe at this time of year for a few weeks (?)--kind of like the Macinaw Peach (if you know Seinfeld, you get it)!!! So if you like persimmons, I suggest this recipe. It was fun, however, to try a new recipe with a new flavor since I feel like I am running out of new ideas and flavors (I know it's not true, but I'm in a cupcake rut, I guess!!). Next up--festive and FUN Christmas cupcakes:)

Pumpkin Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting and Nutter Butter Turkeys, 11/17

Gobble Gobble! Happy (early) Thanksgiving. Since SOMEONE gets a whole week off at Thanksgiving (no complaints here, even if it means a little pay cut), this is Cupcake Wednesday's Thanksgiving. And for the festivities, I have pumpkin cupcakes from a tried and true recipe (into which I added pumpkin pie spice! Oh yes, I am THAT daring) and my cream cheese frosting. Topping these babies off are little "turkeys" made with 1 1/2 Nutter Butters, a few pieces of candy corn, mini chocolate chips, and a little extra frosting. I got the idea from another web site (just Google "Nutter Butter Turkey Cupcakes") and, while they have wings as well, I could NOT for the life of me fit the wings on the turkey. So guess what, my turkey can't fly (wait, can turkeys fly anyway? I know they can run really fast). The turkey cupcakes got rave reviews for their design, and would be great for little kids, but as it is, we turn in to little kids whenever we get around cupcakes, so they worked perfectly for us!

Fun Cupcake-Themed Items

So this is a new topic for my blog, but since I have received so many FUN cupcake themed items in the last year or so, I thought they (and the gift givers) deserved a shout out. I will add posts periodically. The first blog of this sort is dedicated to Lisa (see her blog), who found, at Bath and Body Works, this awesome hand sanitizer!! It absolutely smells like Red Velvet cupcakes, and it even has GLITTER! It's such a Catch-22--I want to use it but I don't want it to get used up too quickly. And at this time of the school year (think flu season and no one covering their mouths--you would think a 16 year old knew to do that by now but I guess not...), teachers are grateful for any type of germ fighter!!

Spice Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting with Jelly Bellys, 11/09

Cupcake Wednesday took place on Tuesday since our week is totally messed up (but I'm not complaining about a four day weekend!). The spiced cupcakes are from Crazy About Cupcakes, and the cream cheese frosting (my own) was dyed a light shade of brown for the base. To celebrate the fall month of November, and the coming of Thanksgiving, I took an idea from What's New, Cupcake! and decorated the cupcakes like "Indian Corn." I had the most fun picking out the Jelly Belly colors and decorating them in a fun pattern. Squished together, they REALLY do look like corn on the cob! The leaves are another issue. The book suggests making it from philo dough, which I did, and it was my first time working with it. Well, mine looks NOTHING like theirs :( , but I tried. The definitely LOOKED like leaves, but propped up around the corn they just kind of fell flat. I suppose I will have to practice to get the technique right. Go to Hello Cupcake's website to see how it REALLY should look (or buy the book, it's TOTALLY worth it!).

Red Velvet Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting in a Graveyard Scene, 10/20

It is getting closer to Halloween and my holiday spirit is picking up. For this week's design, I incorporated some ideas from What's New Cupcake, by Karen Tack and Alan Richardson, along with my own ideas. For the base cupcake, I used red velvet--Martha Stewart's recipe--because it seemed kind of appropriate. The frosting, of course, was cream cheese (my own combination and ratio of ingredients). After frosting, I rolled the cupcakes in ground-up chocolate cookies to make the "dirt," thus beginning my graveyard scene. On separate occasions, I made the trees (the outline of which came from What's New Cupcake) and the grave markers (broken up bits of graham cracker, dipped in melting chocolate, and piped on RIP letters. The rest is store-bought courtesy of Walgreens--candy corn pumpkins and gummy skeletons I cut into pieces and stuck in the frosting. The scene was put together hastily before lunch, but the cute factor is still there, and I like the way it turned out. I think under different circumstances I would like to have put these on a platter and sprinkled more "dirt" on the bottom to fill in the spaces and make it REALLY festive, but I can live with the outcome for today.

PS. As ordered by my Dad, I have reserved some of the leftover cupcakes for him, that are not to be frozen by Mom--this rule (#576 in our lifetime--me, Steve and Erin, that is) is called the King's Fifth (maybe he needs a shirt with this on it). This rule does have more practicality behind it than the Neopolitan ice cream rule though!!!

Honey Cupcakes with Vanilla Frosting as Candy Corn, 10/06

It's October!! Candy corn and Reese's Peanut Butter Pumpkins galore!!! These cupcakes were inspired by two things--a candy corn candle my mom got me last weekend (the "cupcake" in the back!), and the left over candy corn in my pantry from my attempt at candy corn-infused vodka:) The cupcakes are honey flavored, because that is the closest I could think of candy corn tasting like, and it's the same recipe as the "bee" cupcakes. The frosting is just store-bought but dyed with gel dyes to get a vibrant color. Then, using a large star, I swirled the yellow, then orange on top of that, and a dab of white. Festive!!!

Caramel Apple Cupcakes with Vanilla Frosting, 09/01

Cupcake Wednesdays is back!! Which means so is school but a girl's gotta make a living somehow. So the first design for the beginning of the school year is, what else, an apple!! I've never been given an apple though (I have, however, been graced with Reeses Peanut Butter Cups, which I prefer), but it still reminds me of school and fall (and yes, I consider the first day of school to be the first day of fall!!). The cupcakes are caramel apple cupcakes from Crazy About Cupcakes, and the design is from my newest cupcake book, What's New Cupcake? by the authors of Hello Cupcake! My new book--courtesy of Marnie :) The "apple" shape is created from cutting off a tiny bit of the bottom of a mini donut, and then topped with a BUNCH of store-bought frosting dyed red. I then rolled the top of the cupcake GENTLY in red sugar and let them set in the fridge. While that was going on, I cut a tootsie roll length-wise and rolled it into a stem shape. I cut a green leaf out of a green airhead candy and scored it down the middle. I did think these cupcakes looked difficult to put together, but in the end they were not really that difficult!! The hardest part was getting the frosting on the cupcake/donut combination. And once the sugar soaked in to the frosting, combined with the apple/caramel/cinnamon flavor of the cupcake, it tasted a little bit like Cinnamon Toast Crunch, and well, there is nothing bad about Cinnamon Toast Crunch :)