Congrats Jenna!

A friend of mine recently got engaged, so at our girl’s night get together I made some mini cupcakes for the occasion.  I didn’t have a lot of time so I made the cupcakes using a store bought white cake mix. 

First, place cupcake liners in a mini muffin pan and fill them about 3/4ths full with batter.

I found this cookie scoop at Kohl’s which I used for the cupcake batter.  Using a scoop like this will assure that you get the same amount of batter in each cupcake so that you end up with uniform sized cupcakes.

The part I enjoy the most is decorating so I did take the time to make homemade frosting.  Some of you may be fa Buddy Valastro, otherwise known as the Cake Boss on the popular TLC show.  Buddy now has another show, Kitchen Boss, on TLC.  For Valentine’s day he made cupcakes with homemade frosting.  I decided to make this frosting for my cupcakes and it is DELICIOUS!  It’s very light and creamy with vanilla flavoring.  You can find the recipe on the following website:

http://recipes.howstuffworks.com/valentines-vanilla-cupcakes-recipe.htm

As Buddy, suggests be sure to use unsalted sweet cream butter.  I found organic sweet cream butter at the grocery store which worked perfectly.  Mix the frosting per the recipe and then add food coloring if you choose.  I colored half of my frosting purple and left the other half white.

For the frosting you will need:

1 C. Butter (room temp.)

2 1/2 C. Powdered Sugar

2 tsp. Milk

1 tsp. Vanilla Extract

Pinch of Fine Sea Salt

 I chose to do three different designs.  For the first design, start by putting a squirt of colored frosting on each cupcake. 

 Then using a butter knife spread the frosting evenly over the cupcake.

Next, pour some sanding sugar onto a plate.  I used purple sanding sugar for a monochromatic look.

Dip the cupcakes into the sanding sugar to coat the entire surface.

For the second design, pipe white frosting onto the cupcake with a Wilton 2D tip.  This is very simple, and looks elegant.

For the third design, I started by spreading purple frosting evenly over the cupcake as previously described and then added a white flower.  To pipe the flower use a Wilton 2D tip.  Hold the piping bag straight up with the end of the tip just touching the surface.  Squeeze the piping bag to let the icing build up, and slowly twist your wrist.  To dress up the flower add a White Pearl Nonpareil to the center.

Now that the cupcakes are completed, place them on a serving platter.  I placed a small cake stand on a sparkly silver platter for a unique two-tiered look. 

 

My friend happened to bring a bottle of wine that went perfectly with the cupcakes.  What a cute logo!  Cheers!