Maple Cupcakes

Last week was my work's potluck Thanksgiving dinner.  Of course I could have brought in stuffing, or green bean casserole, but I thought I'd use the opportunity to try out a recipe that I've seen.  This one was out of "Martha's Cupcakes" and it seemed perfect for the fall.  Here was what was needed for the maple cupcakes (and yes, that is a ridiculously huge bottle of maple syrup).

The cupcakes were pretty easy to make.  The cake itself tasted like a really sweet dessert pancake.  The frosting was really yummy too, and pretty unique.  If you have this book and want to make this recipe, though, I would suggest only making half of the frosting - there was a ton left over.  

Then, you just make little marzipan leaves (I used store bought marzipan to save time) and color it with some red, brown, and orange.  I couldn't believe it, but one tiny package made enough to cover all of the cupcakes.

All-in-all, I think these turned out pretty good.  They definitely looked pretty and made enough so just about everyone could have some.  I'm just lucky I got them out of the house.  I think Scott may have been sneaking bites here and there.

Diaper Cake

So...the cake in this post was not exactly edible.  My friend, Tiffany, is going to be having her first baby soon, so I decided to make her diaper cake for the baby shower.  This was my first attempt at a diaper cake, but I think it turned out pretty nice.

Of course it had to be all pink since she is having a baby girl.  The only diapers I could find had blue edges, though, so I had to kind of overcompensate with the pink. :)

The bottom tier is made with size 2 diapers and the top two are size 1.  (I don't like the idea of making the cake with newborn sized diapers since some babies are born too big for those.)  Each diaper is rolled and secured, and then they're bundled together to make tiers.  In this case, the bottom two tiers are bundled around a bottle.  Then the layers are stuffed with goodies for the baby.

Congrats Tiffany! 

Joshua's Birthday, Take 2

Some of you may remember a little boy named Joshua who turned 1 last year and got a Teddy Bear Birthday with a Teddy Bear Cake.  Well, he turned 2 this weekend, and this time his parents threw him a Super Why party.    I was asked to make a Super Why cake similar to this one found on Cake Central:

Now, I wasn't sure what Super Why was, so I did a little research.  It's a PBS cartoon where a young boy named Whyatt and his friends, the Super Readers, go into books to solve problems.  He calls up his friends using his "Super Computer" (which looks like a PDA), and then they have story book adventures.  I wanted to keep the cake similar to the picture, but of course I had to have my own spin on it.  

First thing's first - I needed to bake some cakes.

Then it was time to start icing the cake.  This was a yellow cake with raspberry filling and vanilla buttercream.

I think every super hero needs his face on cake, don't you?

I really liked the book in the original cake, so I decided to stick with that idea.

But then I decided to make a Super Computer as well.

Then it was time to add some finishing details with lots of bright colors.

 Add to that some fondant letters.

Put it all together, and you get a birthday cake fit for any super hero!  Happy birthday, Joshua!