Awesome Cupcakes - August and September

Cupcakes are maybe one of the most fun desserts to make. They are personal sized, easy to decorate, quick to make treats that will satisfy almost anyone with a sweet-tooth. I like them because they are particularly fun to decorate and share. If you work in my building or have ever worked with me, you will discover the countless different possibilities of recipes and frosting/topper combinations. Below are some of my favorite cupcakes I have either made or seen in the past 30 days.

This first one, we will call the Gravestone Cupcake....

Use any kind of cake mix with chocolate frosting. Dip the frosting in crushed oreos (I used the food processor). For the headstone, I used Milano cookies, cut in half, and piped RIP in green frosting on them. This was attached by covering the bottom of the Milano with more chocolate frosting and holding into place for about 5 seconds.

The second one here is..... a VEGAN cupcake!

This was also my first time using my tips I got from the Best Ever Cupcake Kit on BakeItPretty.com. I pulled a recipe for Vegan Dark Chocolate cupcakes and Vegan Frosting and substituted the sugar in the cupcake mix for Agave Nectar (substitute the sugar for 2/3 the measurement in Agave nectar...then make sure you decrease the liquids by 1/3 cup-ish).

Now this next one, I confess I did not make, but someone at my work did and I thought it was very pretty and creative.

They used Tye-dye cupcake batter, white frosting, then marshmallows to decorate in the pattern of flowers. The marshmallows are cut diagonally in half (this person used multicolored marshmallows), and then shaken with colored sugar or non-pareils. They will stick because the inside of the marshmallow is sticky.

Lastly, my most recent creation - Chocolate Cupcakes with Peanut Butter Frosting!

I found this recipe from the Barefoot Contessa on FoodNetwork.com and followed it pretty closely. If you use an ice cream scoop, you'll get 2 dozen cupcakes out of the recipe (the website says it will only yield 15). I was pretty shocked at how these turned out, as they call for coffee in the mixture. The frosting was piped on with one of my favorite tips from the Best Ever Cupcake Kit. Needless to say, 2 dozen cupcakes disappeared in less than 2 hours at 7 in the morning.

I can send copies of the recipes I have if anyone is interested. Hope you enjoyed my Wednesday Treat!