Easy Cupcakes

My son was invited to a birthday party at a movie theater, and the mom had made these great popcorn cupcakes. The technique is similar to that seen in the Hello, Cupcake! book and Family Fun magazine: Snip mini marshmallows in half (or leave a few intact) and arrange on top of a cupcake that you’ve wrapped in popcorn bag paper. You can even drizzle yellow frosting “butter” on them if you’d like. What a great theme!

What You Need: 1 cupcake; white frosting; mini marshmallows; printer paper; transparent tape, popcorn artwork (Google!).

How to Make It: Frost cupcake. Wrap cupcake with popcorn-themed wrapper. Secure with tape. Arrange marshmallows to look like popcorn.

These cute bear cupcakes would be great for a baby shower, fairy tale themed birthday party or any Goldilocks who loves cupcakes.

What You Need: 1 cupcake; chocolate frosting; white or vanilla frosting; pink icing (in a tube or in a pastry bag with #1 metal tip and coupler); candy eyes or small candies; pastry bag and #5 metal tip.

How to Make It: Frost cupcake white. Using pastry bag and #5 metal tip, pipe bears: make two faces larger than the third baby bear face and add smaller circles for ears. Add eyes. Use #1 tip and pink icing (or icing in a tube) for nose and mouth.

I used a few shortcuts to make these clown cupcakes quick and easy. I didn’t feel like mixing up icing, or even tinting frosting from a can, so I attached a star tip to Wilton icing in a tube and used that. Also, you could pipe a red mouth, but I just used licorice.

What You Need: 1 cupcake; white frosting; yellow icing in a tube; metal or plastic star tip and coupler; cherry or sour red candy balls; heart-shaped red hots (cinnamon imperials); 2 lime Runts (or other candy); red licorice.

How to Make It: Frost cupcake white. Use star tip and yellow icing with star tip to “draw” hair. Add 2 red hots with points facing inward for bows (You could also use red Runts; they are kind of heart-shaped). Place 2 lime Runts for eyes and a red cherry or sour ball for nose. Add strand of red licorice for mouth. Remember, you don’t have to have these exact candies–just use what you have on hand!

Cupcakes are perfect for Baby’s first birthday party. The one-year-old gets his or her own personal cake to squish, and, of course, cupcakes make for great pictures!
What You Need: 1 cupcake; icing tinted pink or lavender; number 1 candle; kiss-shaped mint candies.
How to Make It: Frost cupcake. Place mint candies around the edge of the cupcake. Add candle to center. That’s it!