So, being the wonderful, amazing friend that I am, I volunteered to bring cupcakes for a monster themed first birthday party for a good friend's son. My first thought was to scratch the whole "homemade" component and just order cupcakes from the bakery. I've recently been on a mission to simplify my life and this just seemed the logical, easiest solution.
But, after a few peeks around Pinterest, and seeing a few easy ideas, I decided that I was up to the task of baking them myself. Afterall, how much more gratifying would it be to show up with amazingly delicious and adorable cupcakes that I actually made myself. After a much longer period on Pinterest, I settled on brightly colored sprinkles and marshmallow eyeballs on toothpicks. However, after a trip to ABC Cake Decorating and a brief discussion with an expert there, I decided to attempt a "grass" tip to make furry monster cupcakes, complete with various sized sugar eyeballs.
I used this recipe for the cupcakes (the only change I made was to use French Vanilla flavored cake mix). http://www.recipegirl.com/2007/03/16/white-wedding-cake-cupcakes/
and I used her buttercream frosting recipe and followed the directions exactly: http://www.recipegirl.com/2007/03/16/wedding-cupcake-buttercream/
I decided on bright colors for my little monsters and bought special food coloring at the cake decorating store, I went with red, blue, green and orange (I added lots of drops to make these colors extra bright).
Notice the bright hues!
Next was the frosting. For this, I used the same colors as my cupcakes.
The grass tip was a bit of a challenge for me, but hey, these are monsters and they don't need to be perfect. With the addition of the eyeballs and mouths, they were perfectly wonderful in my opinion.
End result = Success! One happy little boy, one happy mama and a happy me :)
But, after a few peeks around Pinterest, and seeing a few easy ideas, I decided that I was up to the task of baking them myself. Afterall, how much more gratifying would it be to show up with amazingly delicious and adorable cupcakes that I actually made myself. After a much longer period on Pinterest, I settled on brightly colored sprinkles and marshmallow eyeballs on toothpicks. However, after a trip to ABC Cake Decorating and a brief discussion with an expert there, I decided to attempt a "grass" tip to make furry monster cupcakes, complete with various sized sugar eyeballs.
I used this recipe for the cupcakes (the only change I made was to use French Vanilla flavored cake mix). http://www.recipegirl.com/2007/03/16/white-wedding-cake-cupcakes/
and I used her buttercream frosting recipe and followed the directions exactly: http://www.recipegirl.com/2007/03/16/wedding-cupcake-buttercream/
I decided on bright colors for my little monsters and bought special food coloring at the cake decorating store, I went with red, blue, green and orange (I added lots of drops to make these colors extra bright).
I also decided that striped cupcakes would be way more exciting than one simple color each. I meticulously scooped in layers of two or three colors into each cup. This turned out to be an extremely time consuming step, but in my opinion, very worth it. They were adorable!
Next was the frosting. For this, I used the same colors as my cupcakes.
The grass tip was a bit of a challenge for me, but hey, these are monsters and they don't need to be perfect. With the addition of the eyeballs and mouths, they were perfectly wonderful in my opinion.
Here are a few shots of the other decor and food the hostess had an the party.
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