mahjong cupcakes...!

...all i know about the game is you yell out out a random....2 bam!....or 4 crack!.....or that's what it sounds like....no idea how to play but thought these came out really cute....

.....so had a request this week from our tenant...aka mother in law....who hosts a mahjong get together with the "ladies" every so often......thought the designs on the tiles could be tough....but gave it a try anyway.....started with these.....

.....which is just tinted red, green, and vanilla cake batter...layered and swirled with the colors......kinda christmas-y too....right....?

....the tiles are fondant....not my fav to work with.....but had some leftover and it really worked out for making the tiles.....(btw-don't know how people dye their own fondant...because that must take for days to do to get a really deep color...not fun)....anyway....added a smidge of kelly green food gel to get the nice light green color...it actually matched the color of the tiles really well.....

....the designs were piped with royal icing....thick enough to pipe to keep the design without running...it was a little too thick though and it was hard to pipe through my smallest diameter tip....so it was a little thicker design than i wanted....think it was a wilton #2....


...the fondant tiles with the red, white, and green cupcakes looked really neat.....so even tho you may be a little skeptical of a "project" working out....it may work out better than you think....!

.....anyone play mahjong...?....according to wikipedia....aka the all knowing.....confucious came up with the game...is that true.....?!!...if so that's pretty awesome.....

p.s. i can only take my pics at nite and the shadows are killing me...any suggestions would be appreciated for lighting that makes it look like natural light....! (will be googling that soon....but if anyone has any ideas or websites that would help.....please let me know :) THANKS.

mini pop tarts....!

...since we were hosting turkey day, was looking for something super simple to throw together last minute...and since most are kinda sick of the cupcakes....went with mini pop tarts....been seeing variations of these all over so decided to give them a go.....and cheated a bit by starting with this....

...these literally got put together about 1/2 hour since the crust is pre-made.....(make sure to thaw it....if it's frozen that is....)


...cut into even rectangles...(used a ravioli cutter, but use whatever works best)....just eye-balled it for equal sizes...but you can measure it evenly if you get so motivated.....and fill with whatever jam or jelly you have around....these were made with cherry, peach, strawberry, and candied ginger preserves....if you use multiple jellies then do separate batches (otherwise you have mystery flavors at the end...kinda like when you have to guess what kind of filling is in the chocolate in a valentine's day chocolate box...!)....also when you cover with the top...press down to seal the jam in with a fork....make sure to press hard enough because if not....the layers don't seal as well and some jelly may ooze out....(see bottom left on the photo below).....

...bake at 350 degrees for about 10-15 minutes or until just golden brown.....once totally cool.....drizzle with a mix of confectioners sugar and milk plus a little vanilla...tinted with food coloring gels.....then top with sprinkles or whatever you like.....it looks a lot messier than it actually was....!

.....they were so easy to make....might not go with the chocolate sprinkles next time....since it kinda reminds me of ants attacking a sweet....but you get the idea....!...next time may try making homemade pie crust....1 pre-made pack only made about 15 tarts so go for more packs if you want more....oh and don't overfill with jelly....as that gets messy too.....!

Fire & Ice Cupcakes (Think Heat and Cold Miser or Game of Thrones!)

So remember when I mentioned diving full force into the holidays? Well somehow got the "year without a Santa" song stuck in my head - you know the one.....

....i'm mister white Christmas....i'm mister snow.....i'm mister icicle....i'm mister 10 below....friends call me snow miser...what ever i touch....turns to snow in my clutch...i'm too much!....

....he's mister white Christmas....he's mister snow....he's mister icicle....he's mister 10 below....friends call me snow miser....what ever I touch....turns to snow in my clutch....he's too much!.....

(ba dump baaa dump....ba dump...ba dump baaa dump....ba dump....)

....i'm mister green Christmas....i'm mister sun....i'm mister heat blister....i'm mister 101....they call me heat miser....what ever i touch....starts to melt in my clutch....i'm too much!.....

....he's mister green Christmas....he's mister sun....he's mister heat blister....he's mister 101....they call me heat miser....what ever i touch....starts to melt in my clutch...he's too much!.....

.....i never want to know a day...that's under sixty degrees...i'd rather have it 80...90, 100's a breeze!...

....he's mister green Christmas....he's mister sun....he's mister heat blister...he's mister 101...they call me heat miser...what ever i touch...starts to melt in my clutch...i'm too much!....too much!

Pixar and Disney have nothing on the stop motion 70's animated holiday specials.  Now you can watch them anytime on dvd or YouTube but way back in the day you had to wait for them to be shown the one and only time around Christmas.  And if you missed it well you just missed it and had to wait until the next year to catch it again.  It was awesome and the kiddos actually really love these old shows too which is doubly awesome!

And for those of you going "What the heck is she talking about?" Enjoy and happy turkey day to all!



OR use them for any of your fav hot/cold themes - like the uber popular Game of Thrones series.  So simple and they really scream Fire & Ice!

p.s. If anyone is interested cold miser is made from rock candy and heat miser from candy melts (red and a little yellow mixed together).  Same for the mini misers.  This one was super fun!

vote for these cupcakes...!

....the voting started for sweetest kitchen's mystery box cupcake challenge...the theme this time was "ginger".....vote for the ginger cupcakes with wasabi kit kat frosting here if you like them, that is...!

"i give up" cupcakes....!

....yep, i give up....halloween stuff is in walgreens by the end of august.....turkey paraphernalia shows up in cvs when the kids start school, and holiday/christmas tchotchkes by the time you decide you're in need of some face make-up for the halloween party you forgot you got invited to comes around.....

...so decided today that instead of complaining about how fast the holidays are coming this year yet again.....to just dive in and accept it.....accept that yes....it's less than a week away until thanksgiving....and that means that christmas is only a month or so away.....so in the spirit of that....baked up some christmas cupcakes to start off my acceptance of how fast the time flies and that i will, repeat, will start enjoying the holiday season, no matter how busy life is....

....but you can take short cuts as necessary....!....this is a doctored box mix (use an extra egg and replace the water with 1 cup of buttermilk)....decided to mix it up a bit and still go with green and red cupcakes (tint half the mix with red food gel and half with green)....but sliced them up and mixed and matched the layers....freeze the baked cupcakes first....it's much easier to slice them evenly......

...then filled with a marshmallow buttercream between the layers....swirled on top.....and sprinkled with some red and green large non-pareils...

....life is good and there are so many things to be thankful for....so these are a present to myself for remembering that's the case everyday.....happy holidays....!

look what i got today....!

.....so you know when a blog has a fun contest to win something and you leave a comment along with bunch of other peeps never thinking that you'd win....??!....well i won this very cool decorating book!!!!....and it's loaded with awesome pics of cakes, cookies, and cupcakes.....thank you so much loren from The Baking Sheet (she even wrapped it and included a cute cupcake card!)...she's featured in the book as well as meaghan from The Decorated Cookie...it's one of those books that you just can't put down once you start perusing the pages.....it was so nice to come home and see this after a long day at work.....can't wait to pay it forward one of these days soon :)

turkey cupcakes...!

......ok, caved and did a turkey cupcake....not sure what it is, but not a fan of turkeys or food that's turkey shaped in general.....don't get me wrong...it's tasty and all....it's not thanksgiving without turkey and some killer gravy.....but the actual animal or bird...kinda creeps me out...maybe it's the gobble it does, or that red gobbler thingee which doesn't really have a purpose......a really bad nightmare would involve being trapped in a turkey farm at night....pretty terrifying right?.....

....but with turkey day coming up, the kiddos in kindy are having a thanksgiving day feast and of course they may be getting some cupcakes.....so needed a topper and decided to go ahead and turkey them up.....and was hoping for cute....but afraid these may show up in my turkey dreams too....!

......the cupcakes themselves are a sweet potato recipe (and actual sweet potato not yams) with a cranberry buttercream......

....the turkeys are candy melts....nuked in the microwave for a minute or 2 then piped from a plastic baggie....outlined first with chocolate candy melts....let dry......

.....then fill in with the other colors (you may have to smooth them a bit to fill in all the crevices).....and let dry.....

....flip over so you have the flat side and using some melted candy, attach a yellow candy coated sunflower for the beak and a red candy coated sunflower for the gobbler thing.....

....the recipe used a small sweet potato---roasted, peeled, and then mashed....hubby picked up a white fleshed one not orange, so the color is not orangy like in most recipes......

....they baked up nicely and were super super moist....not a huge sweet potato flavor and they seemed a little more cinnamonny...is that even a word...?....may be it's due to the type of sweet potato used but it definitely contributed to the moistness.....!

....the buttercream is just a vanilla buttercream but with dried cranberries, that were rehydrated in water overnite, then food processed into some mush, then added to the buttercream.....it was probably 1/4 cup of the cranberry mush to 4 cups of buttercream.....


....obviously these are not going to make it to the kindy feast since that's a week and 1/2 away, but needed to practice the turkeys to see if the candy melts would work....still can't decide if they look cute or not....leave a comment and let me know if they are cute or creepy.....!....thanks...!!!!

.....linking these up to Hoosier Homemade's Holiday Cupcake Challenge for thanksgiving cupcakes....!