Normally I don't make cupcakes from a box but I found this recipe for watermelon cupcakes from Hoosierhomemade.com and thought they would be perfect for Labor Day. If you happen to go to her website you will see that she used red and green ice cream cones to put the cake batter in. I tried that but mine didn't turn out that great. The batter in the cone wasn't cooked enough so instead of going back to the store to start over, I just made regular cupcakes. Kroger didn't have watermelon jello but for those of you who live in Texas, I found it at HEB, however if you make the cones, Kroger has those. I also added green and pink gel color because otherwise you will have a slightly pale looking cupcake.
1 box white cake mix
4 eggs
1 cup buttermilk with 1/2 tsp. vinegar mixed in buttermilk and let set for a couple of minutes
1/3 cup oil
1 small box watermelon jello
1 cup mini chocolate chips
Mix all ingredients together. Add pink gel color to half and green gel color to other half. Fold in 1/2 cup chocolate chips to pink batter and 1/2 cup to green batter.
Bake at 350 for 15 minutes.
Frosting: White, pink and green
For the frosting I used a cream cheese frosting and added mini chocolate chips for decoration. Then for the topping I cut some watermelon with a small star cookie cutter and inserted with a toothpick. If you add the watermelon, I would recommend doing it right before serving the cupcakes and wipe off the excess liquid with a paper towel.
Now excuse while I go eat the rest of my watermelon! Yummy!! The cupcakes are for a neighbor (and not the ones who always left their trash cans out by my kitchen window) They moved! Yay!
My friend, Charlene asked me if I could make cupcakes out of a recipe called Orange Sherbet Bundt Cake by SK Hunter which she published on Just a Pinch Recipes. Of course I can make cupcakes out of any cake recipe, but I knew I would change the frosting because the cake just has a glaze. Here is the original recipe:
2 cups flour
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 salt
3 eggs
1 stick butter
1 tsp. vanilla
1 cup melted orange sherbet
1/2 orange with peel/remove core/process in a food processor
1/2 cup instant vanilla pudding or 1 small box
1 cup crushed walnuts (optional)
Glaze:
1 cup powdered sugar
3 Tbsp. melted orange sherbet
1. Preheat oven to 350. In a small bow, whisk together flour, dry pudding mix, baking powder and salt. Set aside.
2. Place sugar and butter in mixer bowl and beat until well combined. Add eggs, one at a time, blending well after each addition. Turn the mixer speed down to low and add vanilla extract and orange.
3. Add the flour mixture and sherbet alternating to the sugar and butter mixture. When it is all combined mix for about 3 minutes on medium speed. Stir in the nuts by hand.
4. Put the batter into a bundt pan that has been greased and floured. Bake for 45-50 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean. Let rest for 10 minutes before inverting on to a plate.
5. When the cake is cool mix together the orange sherbet and the powdered sugar and drizzle over cake.
The only thing I did different for the cupcakes is I didn't add walnuts mainly because I don't like nuts inside the cupcakes. For the frosting I used my buttercream frosting recipe but substituted orange juice and the sherbet for the milk until I got the desired consistency for piping and also added a bit of orange flavoring and orange food gel to make it a pale orange color. Then a fondant tulip on top!
I hope Charlene enjoyed them. She had been in the hospital lately and I wanted to surprise her with a little something to cheer her up!
Thanks for reading! Deana :)
Halloween Cake
Since you know I took a cake decorating class, I've been practicing making cakes as well as cupcakes. My second course got canceled for this month which has given me an opportunity to just practice on my own. I've worked with fondant before so I thought this would be fairly easy to cover the cake and cut out the Halloween designs, a piece of cake as the saying goes. But Ha, not quite! The marbled effect that you see is actually on purpose. I liked the way it looked when I was adding the color so I left it this way although it doesn't quite look as pretty in the pictures. You guys also know that I am not a photographer, but perhaps that will be my next class!
I dragged my sweet husband all over town looking for something to attach the top witch, bat and ghost to until I finally decided to just use popsicle type sticks. The orange, white, and black bottom border and top for the display is rolled fondant.
More Halloween designs to come because I have all these new Halloween cookie cutters to make some fun things! Until next time, thanks for reading. Deana :)
I had been planning to make Olympic cupcakes in July but as you can see it is now the weekend of the end of the 2012 Olympics so these will be the closing ceremony cupcakes. Perhaps I will start thinking about the 2014 Olympics now so I might have those ready before the winter olympics start.
Making the fondant olympic rings was not as easy as I had envisioned. I don't have any round cookie cutters that tiny and since I waited until the last minute it was a little too late to order anything. While making the beach cupcakes, it occurred to me that I could use the back of the decorating tip for the outside and a smaller round tip for the inside. Ah, perfect!
The printable cupcake round toppers I found from thepurplepumpkin.co.uk, cut them out, glued them on a popsicle stick and tied red, white and blue ribbon around it.
Maybe I should start contemplating Halloween now!
Deana :)
