Flower cupcakes for spring

(photography skills improving somewhat??)

Sometimes  I bake cakes and things for family friends to make a bit of money. These were for a lovely grandmother's birthday. I wasn't quite sure what she wanted, so I just made what I was in the mood for - spring!

As well as showing off my recent handiwork, I though I'd share some tips about cupcake decorating I've figured out over the years.

1. You can't really go wrong with American buttercream. 

While Swiss-meringue might be the bomb on wedding cakes, there's really nothing like a big bite of pure sugar and butter on top of a cupcake. Along with the taste factor, it's also really tough to screw up this kind of icing. 

I like to start with either 1/2 cup of softened butter, or 1/4 cup of butter and 1/4 cup of vegetable shortening. From there, you can pretty much do anything you want. Alternately add cups of icing sugar with a tablespoon of milk until you reach the desired consistency. Then, add flavouring (vanilla? cocoa? marmite?), and/or food colouring. How thick you want it really depends on what you're doing with the icing. To get the icing to keep its shape on the cupcakes, I tested it by lifting up the beaters and seeing if it held in place for 30 seconds or so. 

2. Good piping tips = pretty cupcakes 

Some people have been able to magic beautiful icing shapes out of plastic bags, but for me (and probably for beginners) it's much easier to just invest in a nice icing tip and piping bag that you can reuse many times. For these ones I used the wilton "1M Swirl" tip. To make the rose shape, start icing from the middle and spiral your way out. 

3. Fondant isn't the enemy 

I used to believe that fondant was extremely difficult to handle, disgusting, and to be avoided at all costs. That was until I figured out how easy and affordable it was to make marshmallow fondant at home. It's a dream to work with, and costs a fraction of the stuff you buy at the store. Use it to cover the tops of cupcakes, or use cookie cutters to cut out little flowers like I did.

Happy cupcaking, and a very happy Easter to those celebrating!

Aurora awakes

Well, spring has come to Ontario. Kind of. It snowed this morning, but I'm getting good spring vibes. Plus I read that it's going to be 17 above on Friday. So, SPRING! 

 Life's been interesting lately. Also very busy, hence the non posting. I found out last week that I've been accepted into my two top universities, so HURRAY! I'll be studying music education this fall! Audition success! 

Now that my school schedule has cleared up considerably, I've also had a lot more time to practice, which makes me very happy. 

Lately I've been thinking back to last May when I was part of a really cool auditioned wind orchestra for a week. It was intense; we had about nine hours of rehearsal sometimes. There were also only four flutes, and I was the only person on my part, so there was a lot of pressure to get things right. But we also did things like visiting the Toronto Symphony's dress rehearsal, listening to the Eastman Wind Ensemble, and eating way too much pizza. I got to play some beautiful music (including 'Aurora Awakes') with a lot of incredibly talented people.

So I have a lot of hope for the next six years of my life, if it can be anything like last year. I'm so lucky to be able to study what I really love. 

Regular obsessive baking posts will return shortly. 

Happy spring,

E