happy halloween!

...adding some to the day's festivities....! .....did a freaky cupcake for the holiday already, so went with some more traditional ones for the actual day.......

spider and candy corn cupcakes....!

....and some mini ghosts for the little's halloween school party.......these are really just chocolate minis with vanilla buttercream piped into a swirl with chocolate chips for eyes....not sure if they look like ghosts or monsters, but either way i guess they work for halloween....!

......the spiders were fun to make and are a modified boxed chocolate cake (add an extra egg and 1 cup of buttermilk in place of the liquid) to save some time....frosted with "grey" icing (which i had originally intended on making lavender for another project, but remember when in school they told you red and blue make purple....?....well for me it made a lovely shade of grey when using the food coloring gels....go figure.....dipped in black non-pareils......

.....with these for the "eyes".......

....and these for the "legs"......

....the candy corn cupcakes....are not candy corn flavored....since we do not have candy corn fans around here......so to use up some of the tons of apples around lately and the apple cider recently purchased while pumpkin pickin.....these are apple cider cupcakes with vanilla buttercream...white, and tinted yellow and orange....the cake is pretty yummy especially with the fresh grated nutmeg....it's a dense and moist cake.......

.....hope everyone has a really fun and spooky halloween.....!

pink velvet cupcakes!

...so even though i've only done red velvet cupcakes from a box.....ran across pink velvet in my explorations in the baking blogdom universe.....pink velvet is red velvet's "little sister"....whatever that means....regardless, decided to give it a go tonite...if you live under a rock and have never heard of red velvet cupcakes, it's basically a chocolate cake made with buttermilk and vinegar with lots and lots of red food coloring....so this pink velvet uses white chocolate, half and half, and a tiny bit of pink food coloring gel.....that's kinda opposite, right?....

....after baking the cupcakes sank a little...anyone know why?....the batter seemed really "fluffy" and buttery.....maybe it was whipped up too much???....i've noticed that happens with some recipes though....usually some of the from scratch recipes, the box mixes never do this.......must be all those artificial ingredients and preservatives....!

....2 bars (4 oz each) of this was nuked until just melty and added to the batter......


....used a vanilla buttercream icing and just a few of these on top......thought they should be kept simple....but they are carnival sprinkles so much more fun than regular sprinkles (jimmies to those from south jersey)....!

....they came out pretty cute, and the cake is really moist and a little dense...like red velvet....!


...here's more of the color....i think i'll call these pinky tuscaderos' from now on......anyone, anyone....?...oh oh oh, should have done a chocolate fonzi next too one of these....!....next time.....!

......one of the kiddos has to get bloodwork done tomorrow....so i'm bringing these pinky tuscaderos in for the ladies there because they have been so awesome....super quick and super nice to the screaming kid that has been to their office way too many times in her short 3+ years....they are also for this month's breast cancer awareness (go check your pinky tuscaderos if you have them---see how i did that...?)....anyway, enjoy!

halloween brownies!

....simple, simple, simple....and if you have kiddos, these are pretty easy so they can help make them too (if you can keep your type A personality in check and let go having perfectly symmetrical stripes---not that i had that problem at all, no not at all...i definitely do not mind having overlapping stripes all over the place and pumpkins not perfectly centered....no, not at all, really not at all)....

.....anyway, make your favorite brownie mix (i made them more "cake-y" so it's easier to cut them out)....and you'll need these....michael's has the neat "spooky" green color out now....

...and these....

.....found the pumpkin and skull molds at a dollar type store for 99 cents each...wasn't sure if they would work well, but they did the job just fine...and a round cookie cutter to make the round brownies...however not really necessary at all and you could just cut out brownies squares......

.....melt the candy melts in a plastic baggie for 30 seconds at a time till it's all melty...."pipe" into the molds and then pop into the freezer for a few minutes (they should come right out of the molds without any trouble)....when you have them all done, have the kids just squirt some melted candy all over the cut out brownies and plop a molded candy in the middle before it dries.....and remember this is all for fun and do not to yell at your 6-year old..."i said in the middle...!".......because he or she may look at you like you're a bit nuts then say...."sorry mommy"......and you don't want to have to think about how you traumatized your kid while making brownies for "fun".......anyway, they were tasty and the chocolate feinds around here loved them especially with the spooky skulls....is it halloween yet???

....spooky house we did from a kit for "fun" as well....!

the "fauxstess" cupcake!

you know these things....

....so not sure what happened with the photographing skills...maybe it's because my point and click is starting to come apart at the metal seam or that it's been dropped a dozen or so times or that it's just old.....because it can't be the photographer's mad picture taking skills....that's just clearly impossible....don't they look a bit techno color with the funky background....?!!

....anyway these were chocolate cupcakes with chocolate ganache on top filled with marshmallow icing (tinted orange) and piped with the same on top.....some with the traditional hostess swirls and some "boo" for practice for halloween.....


....and fyi, these were sooooo delicious....much better than the originals....make these....they are not too hard and even if you skip the filling....the bittersweet chocolate ganache is the best and really simple to make....i'm wondering if you can make a white chocolate ganache...?...i have another idea floating around that needs a new icing.....back to google...i mean studying...!

bride of frankenstein cupcakes!

....in the spirit of all that's halloween....adding my own cuppies to the mix....

....start with these.....(which happen to be gluten free chocolate cupcakes with green marshmallow frosting in some new fangled martha stewart halloween cupcake liners).....

...then add this....


...and a smidge of this...

...to get these.....!

...happy early halloween.....! (fyi, don't let the cotton candy sit too long in the icing, or it kinda does a wicked witch of the west routine...)

also some neat halloween ideas over at hossier homemade's cupcake tuesday...head on over....!

 

too wet to go out, too cold to play ball...!

....figured it's a cat in the hat kinda day, with the mega rains on the east coast....made these awhile back but may have to make them again soon if this rain keeps up....these were red velvet with cream cheese icing, the hat is a marshmallow cut in half with red icing in between. The brim is an iced gingersnap cookie, and icing dotted around the brim (fyi, if they sit awhile, the gingersnap does not stay crisp)


...really want to do a green eggs and ham cake for one of the littles or a thing 1/thing 2 cake...hopefully i can talk them into it before they start requesting some type of pokemon or ben 10 alien...!...and will i succeed??... yes indeed, 98 and 3/4 percent guaranteed...

dots "cupcakes"

...had fun with the kids tonite making some micro desserts...ok it's basically just candy, but look how cute.....it's just dots gum drops piped with icing, with a matching sprinkle on top....

....and if you want to do them for halloween.....you can too!....they are making flavors for halloween......

....ghost dots (assorted fruit flavored), candy corn dots (obviously candy corn flavored), and bat dots (blood orange flavored)....they were a huge hit with the kiddos (except for the candy corn ones--a thumbs down given by 2 out of 3)

...and to put the size into perspective....!...ok i've definitely procrastinated enough, back to studying.....

not ready for summer to be over....!

...really really really (really) not ready for summer to be over....it flew by way to fast.....it was 80+ here in jersey so we had an end of the summer bbq today with friends (someone made ribs!) with these for dessert.....tried a new chocolate cupcake recipe, with the go to buttercream icing.....yum......

....would love these in the yard as hydrangeas are one of my favorite flowers, but they are apparently delectible to the deer around here (along with our hostas)....so we have trouble keeping them around....so these will have to due....although they didn't really last that long either...!

....i've seen these cupcakes online and thought they were so pretty so had to try them....!

Fla-Vor-Ice Cupcakes

...made with these.....!


....for Sweetest Kitchen's Mystery Box Cupcake Challenge - actually the flavor is a "childhood memory".....so going with the flav-or-ice cupcakes from the summer!...i so loved ice pops when i was a kid, maybe it was the colors they came in, maybe they just tasted so great in the blazing heat, maybe it was the combo of the crunchy ice pop and drinking the juice as it melted in the plastic (admit it you loved that too!) or maybe i loved seeing everyone's colored tongues after eating them, whatever it was they still make me smile....didn't get them all the time either, so when we had them it was a treat....my order of pref for flavors was blue (i'm sure it's some sort of raspberry flavor, but it was always called blue...then lime, grape, cherry, and orange came dead last for me....figured the flavors could fit with cupcakes....and they did--very pretty pastel colors and subtle ice-popy flavor.....added one "giant" flav-or-ice (unfrozen) in place of the liquid in vanilla cupcakes and added almost one pop to some vanilla buttercream icing....also "injected" some of the liquid into the cooled cupcakes as well....and here they are:

...and some of the process...divided the mix (without liquid) and then added an ice pop to each bowl.....you could add more coloring to get the colors more like the ice pops themselves, but i kinda like the subtle pastels they came out.....

...don't mind the old cupcake pans...they are super old....i think they were my moms....

...didn't get any pics of it, but injected some ice pop into the centers to give it a little more flavor....it worked pretty well....

...then frosted with the flavored buttercreams.....yum.

The winner of September’s Mystery Box Cupcake Challenge will receive prizes from:


• Bake It Pretty; a $5 electronic gift card


• Bakerella; an autographed copy of her new book Cake Pops


• Beanilla; 2 each of 4 special vanilla beans


• Hello Hanna; a pack of Sweet Stands cupcake stands


• Miss Kitty Creations; a handmade cupcake charm of your choice


• Sweet Cuppin Cakes; a prize pack worth $25


• Tundra Books; a selection 3 very sweet children’s books

Thank you to all our prize sponsors!

icing tip FAIL...!

...how do you get a perfect plain icing swirl...? .....like this....



or perfect dollop...like this?

..i thought you just need a ginormous tip, so i got a huge one and tried it, but it was too big and didn't fit the coupler i had, so couldn't get a good swirl going....and ended up with this...

...and thus, this....yuck.

...plus the colors started to blend toward the end and looked more like a green-yellow mustard rather than bright blue, yellow, and pink swirled icing.......more practice needed, blah.