Easy Cupcakes

For Easter or anything, these bright pink bunny cupcakes will be a hit with the kids.

What You Need: cupcake; pink frosting (strawberry in a can works well); 1 pink Mentos candy; 2 mini marshmallows; 2 pink Jordan almonds; 2 mini chocolate chips; 2 Tic Tacs.

How to Make It: Frost cupcake. Frost 3 sides of each mini marshmallow and place on cupcake for bunny cheeks. Add Mentos nose, Tic Tac teeth, mini chocolate chip eyes, and 2 Jordan almond ears.

Make the ears less pointy, and it’s a lamb! I modified this idea from a magazine. So cute for Easter.

What You need: cupcake; white frosting; mini marshmallows; 1 large marshmallow; 2 1/2 pink Jelly Belly jelly beans; 2 mini chocolate chips; kitchen shears.

How to Make it: Cut large marshmallow in half widthwise, pinch to form points, and add jelly beans to the sticky sides. Place near top for ears. Arrange mini marshmallows to form rabbit fur. Cut jellybean in half and place for nose. Add two mini chocolate chips for eyes.

You can get quite creative with this idea: decorate a chocolate candy Easter egg and place it upon a next of coconut grass.

What You Need: 1 cupcake; white frosting; shredded coconut tinted green with food coloring; unwrapped flat-bottomed chocolate egg (found this one, wrapped in foil, by Russell Stover in my grocery store’s bulk foods section); various writing gels and other decorations.

How to Make It: Use gel or liquid food coloring to tint coconut green (a plastic zip-close bag works well for this). Sprinkle on cupcake. Unwrap chocolate. Use writing icing, candy confetti, and other edible treats to decorate your egg just how you like it. Place on top of cupcake.

I first saw this idea, using a circus peanut candy as a carrot, in Parents magazine. It’s so easy! If you don’t have stand-style licorice or fruit candy in green, just cut strips of a fruit roll.

What You Need: cupcake; white frosting; orange circus peanut; green fruit candy strips; something to poke a hole with (bamboo skewer, toothpick, etc.)

How to Make It: Frost cupcake. Poke hole in end of circus peanut. Insert several strips of fruit roll.

I like this lamb cupcake better than the marshmallow sheep I posted previously. By cutting the mini marshmallows in half (“shearing” the sheep, so to speak), you can make a cupcake that has dimension but isn’t overloaded.

What You Need: 1 cupcake; white frosting; mini marshmallows; 2 brown mini M&Ms; 2 black candy-covered licorice pieces; red gel writing icing; kitchen shears or scissors.

How To Make It: Frost cupcake. Use scissors to cut each marshmallow in half and arrange as shown, circling the entire cupcake and then a couple of rows near the top. Add M&M eyes and licorice legs and then draw in the red mouth with gel icing.

A fuzzy-looking chick cupcake is great for Easter or barnyard parties. This design is very similar to one that ran in Family Fun magazine.

What You Need: 1 cupcake; white or yellow frosting; shaved coconut; yellow dye (liquid, gel or paste); gummy orange slice; chocolate chips; scissors or knife.

How to Make It: Frost cupcake. Tint coconut in a bowl or baggie by adding dye and mixing. Sprinkle on top of cupcake. Use scissors to cut off bit of orange slice and make beak shape. Place on cupcake. Add chocolate chip eyes.

Cut apart sugar-coated fruit gel or “gem” candies to make these chick cupcakes for Easter, a farm party or anytime. They also make cute baby shower cupcakes.

What You Need: 1 cupcake; yellow or other light-colored icing; 3 yellow fruit gels or gems; 1 orange fruit gel or gem; 2 blue mini M&Ms; scissors, kitchen shears or knife.

How to Make It: Frost cupcake. Cut a small (approx. 1/4 inch) amount off the bottom of one yellow fruit gel for chick body and position about 1/2″ from bottom of the cupcake, cut edge facing down. Cut second yellow fruit or gel or gem in half and position to left and right of body for wings. Place third gel on top of body for head. Cut two medium triangle wedges for feet and a small wedge for beak. Adhere beak and blue M&M eyes to head using small dabs of icing.