Easy cupcake decorating part 3

It's SO easy to make cupcakes look fancy, to make it look like you worked sooooo hard on making them look fabulous.  Below you will find some decorating tips to use to take your cupcakes to the next level...

First up, decorating cupcakes with a Wilton #2D tip.

To get this ruffle look, as your are swirling clockwise and up, shake your hand gently, it will create beautiful ruffles on your cupcake.

With a medium pressure squeeze your pastry bag, then lift.  Do this over and over until the cupcake is covered.  It will create a hydrangea type flower.

Mint chocolate chip cupcakes

In my house mint chocolate chip ice cream is a favorite...Well, I of course had to make a cupcake version and make it I did. Whenever I make these, they are gone within a day! 

Use my chocolate cake recipe and buttercream recipe, adding 1/2 teaspoons of peppermint extract and 1-2 drops of leaf green gel food coloring to the buttercream.  Use a Wilton #1M tip for the icing swirl and sprinkle with semi-sweet chocolate chips!  YUM!

Beach themed cupcakes

 These are vanilla cupcakes with vanilla buttercream icing.  Check out recipes for both the cake and icing under the "sweet recipes" tab.

I used Americolor good coloring gel to color the icing, then I used a round decorator tip to pipe it on.

For the sand, I used graham cracker crumbs and a little brown sugar mixed together and sprinkled on the icing.

The shells and starfish are made from white chocolate.  I melted down a bag of white chocolate chips in a microwave safe bowl, then poured the chocolate into a plastic mold.  Put the mold in the freezer for 10 minutes then removed the starfish and shells from the mold.

To get the color on the shells and starfish, I used petal and luster dust.  This can be found in any cake supply store.  I picked out colors that I thought would make the shells and starfish look realistic.  Brush the petal and luster dust on with a small paint brush.  Set on the cupcake and you're done!  These look really complicated but are SUPER easy, anyone can do it!

The chocolate molds can also be found at your local cake and candy supply store.  If you are having trouble finding them, send me an email and I can pick some up at my local store and will be happy to sell them to you.  They are $2.50 each.

Snowball cupcake

Classic snowball cupcake, check out the recipe under the "sweet recipes" tab.