Black Friday Cupcakes

On Black Friday, basically everyone has to work. It makes sense. And we always have a potluck lunch. The store provides meat and potatoes, and we bring all the sides and desserts. I had no idea what to make. So I went to my default-- cupcakes :) But I didn't want to make a heavy, chocolate, or pumpkin cupcake, since we'd probably have lots of those flavors. Plus, Doug's been bugging me to make him a vanilla cupcake. So I did a white cupcake with a pretty swirl vanilla frosting. I've gotten a little better at frosting them.

Then I decided I wanted to make them look a little fancier.

I thought they turned out really good. And I love the cherry-- it almost makes them look a little more Christmas-y with the gingerbread boy liners. Hopefully they'll taste good too!

Chocolate Oranges

Last weekend, Marcus and I had a chocolate orange. Those are so good! I love Christmas time :) Well, I know it's not really Christmas time yet, but come on, I work retail. Christmas starts in October. Anyway, I was inspired for this month's Third Sunday (on the Second Sunday) dinner's cupcakes. The frosting didn't quite turn out how I planned, so I improvised. And I must say, I think I like this better.

They're orange chocolate cupcakes with orange chocolate frosting, topped with... wait for it... orange zest and chocolate pieces. Go figure ;)

YUM!

Jack-O-Lanterns

Isn't it amazing that it's already the end of October??? Seriously though. Crazy! For Halloween, I decided to make... CUPCAKES :) I never really got into the whole carving pumpkins/costumes and whatnot, but I tried to be a little festive with pumpkin cupcakes. They don't taste like pumpkin because I thought that was more for Thanksgiving, but they almost look like them:

And Marcus obviously had some fun decorating the pumpkins too

We have Jack-o-lantern cupcakes!!! Can you guess which one is my favorite???

Do you spy Jack the Pumpkin King? the pumpkin that's a basketball for Halloween? a pig? Ron Weasley? Ha.

Here's my favorite... Obviously :)

And Marcus' favorite. "He says RAWR!!!"

Root Beer Floats

Now here was an entirely new challenge... Soda in a cupcake. Seriously.

They turned out better than I thought. But I would've used more root beer :)

The frosting was an adventure too. I had to whip it up on the stove, with more root beer of course.
But it gave the little guys a very smooth look. :)

They were yummy. Very, very sweet.

Fresh Fruit

I made these cupcakes two weeks ago, and they were pretty good. Not my best, but you could taste the lemon and blueberry-- you can definitely see the blueberry too. I had never baked with fresh fruit before, so that was an adventure. Both the batter and frosting did something funny (which more affected texture than taste), and I blame my work schedule. It pushed me to go too fast in order to get to work on time :)

Emma

I had to include this...

Emma really likes chocolate cupcakes :)

Colorblind

Today I made cupcakes in honor of my Papa. I loved joking with him about how he couldn't tell the difference between anything red or green...

...So these are colorblind cupcakes :) Black and white.

Snickerdoodles

This time, I made snickerdoodle cupcakes in cute leopard print liners for Juliana's birthday. And I loved these :) They were cinnamon cupcakes with cinnamon frosting. Yum! And they even looked cute this time. Or at least cuter than the last time for just simple frosting. I always make Marcus choose the ugliest cupcake and try that one. That way, no one sees the ugliest one, and I know for sure if they taste decent. He approved of these. :)

I finally got a little better at frosting them!!! Hopefully next time around they're even better :)

Chicago was sad that I wouldn't let her get close to the cupcakes.

And I had these really cool candles that have different color flames. So I used those on the birthday plate for Juliana.

You can kind of see it in this picture.

YAY CUPCAKES.

I think I have a cupcake problem. Haha.

Taste Challenge

I've decided it's time for me to learn how to really frost a cupcake. I didn't want to just decorate the little guys, so I found a great recipe in one of my cookbooks and crossed my fingers. I wanted them to look simple but taste great. It was a cinnamon apple cupcake with cream cheese frosting. And they tasted pretty good. Sadly, frosting them was more of a disaster. So some of them just got sprinkled. Marcus said they were the best tasting cupcakes I've made, so we call it the Taste Challenge. :)

The frosting madness...

Getting closer to a pretty cupcake:

One day I'll make some truly cute cupcakes. But until then, I'll stick to the fun, colored liners. :)

Angry Birds

This month for Third Sunday Dinner, my mom gave me this idea based on America's new favorite past-time...

That's right, Angry Birds. It's definitely taking over EVERYTHING! Good thing it's a fun game :) So we'll take a quick tour through the levels...

Now the blue ones that multiply:

Then my favorite, the ones that accelerate and break through all the wood barriers:

And the mean (and laughing) little piggies:

The whole group that joined us for dessert:

Red Velvet

JULY 2011

I finally did it. Cupcakes from scratch. Not to give away all my secrets, but cake mixes really do make great cupcakes. Instead of decorating for this month's family dinner, I wanted to make a good Red Velvet cupcake (since everyone on Cupcake Wars can do that!). And I thought they were pretty good. Usually I don't really eat any, but I had two of these.

The frosting wasn't fancy or anything, but it was good.

I was a little nervous about taking them because I wasn't sure if they were good or not. Luckily I had a great taste tester from the Stakland family.

I think she liked them :)

Wise Guys

JUNE 2011

Obviously there would be no holiday unless I made some ridiculous cupcakes. Don't worry, Father's Day was a success! I made Wise Guys for all the wise guys in my family...