Easy Cupcakes

A heart-shaped muffin cup or cupcake liner makes the perfect shape for Santa’s face!

What You Need: Aluminum (such as by Reynolds), silicon or other heart-shaped muffin tin or cupcake liner; white frosting; red sprinkles; 5 mini marshmallows; shaved coconut; 2 blue mini M&Ms; 1 black M&M; 1 round or tear-shaped red candy.

How to Make It: Turn heart shape upside down and frost curved part white for beard base. Sprinkle with coconut. Frost very top of heart point for hat. Sprinkle with red sugar or sprinkles. Add marshmallows to bottom of hat, plus one at the top. Add candy eyes, nose and mouth.

If you like frosting, you’ll like this Santa cupcake in which Mr. Claus sports a generous beard.

What You Need: 1 cupcake; white frosting; red sugar or sprinkles; 2 black or brown M&Ms; 1 red hot candy (cinnamon imperial); pastry bag and star tip, or tube icing with star tip, or aerosol can icing.

How to Make It: Frost cupcake white. Spinkle some red sugar near top of cupcake for hat. With star tip, add hat brim and pom pom. Then, add beard. Add M&M eyes and red hot nose.

There’s a huge amount of frosting on this cupcake, so prepare for a Santa-themed sugar shock. There are several ways you could approach a Santa hat design, but I didn’t feel like getting out the pastry bag and 1M swirl tip, so I just piled on the red frosting and whipped out my can of Betty Crocker Decorating Cupcake Icing.

What You Need: 1 cupcake; frosting tinted red (use no-taste red in paste form for best results); white aerosol icing.

How to Make It: Pile on a nice, tall mound of red icing. Use aerosol icing with star tip attached to pipe a border around the rim of the cupcake and a pom pom for the top of the hat.

These cute Santa cupcakes are quick to make and would make a great kids’ activity for the holidays. Just set up a “cupcake station” with marshmallows, M&Ms, red hots and coconut and let them have at it!

What You Need: 1 cupcake (baked and cooled); white or off-white frosting; red food coloring; coconut flakes; brown M&Ms; cinnamon imperials (red hots); miniature marshmallows.
Make That Cupcake!: Be sure to reserve some frosting to tint red using paste or liquid food coloring. Frost lower 2/3 of cupcake top white and top 1/3 red. Add a row of marshmallows where the two colors meet to make the brim of his Santa cap. Stick one marshmallow near the back for the tip of his cap. Sprinkle on coconut beard. Add brown M&M eyes and red hot nose. Ho, ho–you’re done!