Pretty in pink I Do wedding cupcakes plus glitter snowflake and white butterfly cupcakes

Beautiful I Do pink marzipan rose cupcake by Charlotte's Cupcakes in Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria, UK (who can be reached at charlottescupcakes at ymail.com), via Flickr.



Also from their Flickr account, a glittery pink snowflake cupcake and a beautiful white butterfly wedding cupcake:

4Rivers Sweetshop's Forthcoming Chips and Soda Cupcakes

From the Today Show blog, "Coke and potato chips in cupcakes?" From Orlando's 4Rivers Smokehouse and forthcoming 4Rivers Sweetshop, John Rivers bakes cupcakes with flavors that include Ruffles and Coke; Mountain Dew and Doritos.

Tips quoted directly from story.

•  The key secret to using soda in cakes is to create a syrup out of it; boil it and reduce to about 25 to 30 percent, until it’s nice and thick – you can use that in place of some of other liquid in the batter recipe. You can also use it in the icing, but you only need a little bit; otherwise it will become runny.
•  You can use potato chips in the batter and they will turn out fine when baked, but chips like Doritos should be reserved for a topping, as they turn black when baked.

Food Trend Watcher Kara Nielsen On Cupcakes

We have been blogging about cupcakes for nearly seven years and almost from the start people have gleefully volunteered their disdain for cupcakes. There's some cupcake haterade out there, so it is nice to see some appreciation for the cupcake from an expert. Kara Nielsen, trendologist at Center For Culinary Development, gives her take on cupcakes. 

How do trends usually play out after the end-of-year lists fade from memory? Look at cupcakes: It’s a trend, but where, and for whom? They started in the late 1990s with Magnolia Bakery, but moms never stopped making cupcakes, and cupcake liners were never not in the grocery store. I even think of the cupcake trend as not the cupcake trend but the specialty bakery trend. If you follow them up the trend map, basically they’re not new anymore, and they ceased to be a trend in the sense of moving—they have arrived, part of our pantry or vernacular. On the other hand, there are fads like low carb, where the industry made low-carb foods that weren’t satisfying and didn't sell and were too expensive and disappeared. Things that disappear too quickly go down in the record book as fads.

On the topic of cupcakes, will they ever go away? And what’s your answer to the eternal question of what will be the next cupcake? I do think people will tire of them a bit, but nothing is sitting on the top of my head right now as the thing that’s going to take over for the cupcake. I will say, I'm getting tired of talking about these Americana desserts with marshmallows and peanut butter. The real key is trying to understand what’s driving a trend, which we don’t hear as much about as "This is a trend." Food trends typically need to meet a consumer need in some way for them to become in demand. It’s a really basic thought, but when you look at an item and think, "What need is this filling?"—that’s when it gets interesting.

VEGAN Snickerdoodle Cupcakes! With recipe link

Vegan. 
A lot of bakers, myself included, get intimidated by vegan baking.
What?!?! No eggs? No milk? No butter??

I'll admit I was hesitant to try baking vegan but at the behest of my family and friends-- I tried it! And they came out delicious!!!

Super super amazing. Even my sister-- a very picky eater-- loved them!

I realized that the thing about vegan baking is SUBSTITUTION. You can really turn any recipe into a vegan recipe if you the know the right substitute ingredient.

You can do it!! For the full recipe and more photos click here

Happy Vegan Baking!!! : )

Cupcake shoulder tattoo

This cupcake shoulder tattoo is via Twitpic and is by King Tat Tattoos in Tucker, Georgia.

Naughty or nice holiday cupcakes by Boston cupcake bakery Sweet

Holiday spirit cupcakes by Sweet in Boston (Back Bay) and Harvard Square in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Keep up with them at sweetcupcakes.com and on Facebook and @sweetcupcakes_ on Twitter

Pick Up A Just Baked Cupcake At #DTW

A couple of months ago, I was invited to a ribbon cutting of Just Baked's new production facility in suburban Detroit.  I had a blast and even met Jesse Jackson. Owner Pam Turkin alerted me to more good news. Just Baked cupcakes are now available at the Detroit Wayne County Airport.

From her email:

Just Baked is now featured at Detroit Metro Airport in 4 locations!  We just introduced this week and they flew out of there, literally!!  Very exciting for us and we hope to continue growing this program.  

If you flying in or out of Detroit for the holidays, you may want pick up a 2-pack of  Just Baked cupcakes.  I had the cupcakes myself and they were mighty good.

 Photo From the Ribbon Cutting

Pistachio Cupcakes with Recipe Link

Mmm. Pistachios...I admit. I'm addicted to them. My favorite pistachio cupcake was definitely from Crumbs...it's a pistachio lovers paradise in a cupcake.

This is the first time I've heard of mixing pistachios with champagne though! A Spicy Perspective created these Pistachio Cupcakes topped with a Pink Champagne Frosting. The recipe can be found here along with some little helpful tips to ensure your cupcakes turn out as lovely and delicious as the original recipe!

COOK’S NOTES:

• Pistachio and almond extract taste very similar. If you can’t find pistachio extract, no worries.
• Champagne extract is sold at baking supply stores. To make the frosting without it, simmer 1/2 a cup of champagne until in reduces down to a couple tablespoons.
• The flour base of the frosting will thicken to a paste consistency when cooked. Make sure to whisk the entire time so you don’t have clumps.

5 guitar cupcake toppers plus cupcake guitar pick earrings for those who can't afford the cupcake guitar on Etsy

In case you were wondering, the $450 cupcake ukelele and $950 6 string cupcake guitar are still for sale on Etsy by Celentano Woodworks, in case you want to get one for yourself or as a gift (one has to wonder which instrument is next, right?):


cupcake ukelele


cupcake guitar

Combine your love of rock with your love of cupcakes with these fun guitar cupcake toppers, all on sale from Etsy sellers - click through on each photo to be taken to the page selling it. Note: not all cupcake toppers are edible.






eco-friendly metal guitar pick cupcake toppers




this listing is for the guitar cupcake toppers on top but also featured a photo of the cute guitar cupcake wrapper in the second photo; Etsy seller ScrappThis also sells a selection of cupcake wrappers (though I didn't see the guitar ones for sale at this time)





Plus a bonus: cupcake guitar pick earrings!

Portland, Maine cupcake report: turtle, mint chocolate, coconut, peanut butter chocolate and Elvis bacon cupcakes by Y-Lime's Gourmet

I was in Portland, Maine a week and a half ago and loved it! It was my first trip to Maine but definitely not my last, and I got to see lots of great art, eat amazing food and explore. Coffee is big there too, and at one of the outposts of local coffeeshop Coffee by Design I met up with Emily Roper of Y-Lime's Gourmet ("Y-Lime's" is "Emily" backwards, without the hyphen!), who gave me a box filled with amazingly delicious cupcakes, some very, very large and some "mini" (her mini cupcakes are actually pretty big).

You can also find their cupcakes at Stonyfield Cafe, PeRx-U-Up Cafe and The Gorham Grind in Gorham. She is adding a third size, a more average/regular size, to her offerings soon. She does custom cupcakes, including events, and doesn't need much notice (she prefers a week, but can do 24 hours) and sells them at the local branches of Coffee by Design. And she sells ice cream! Find out more at their Facebook page and contact Emily about orders at ylimesgourmet or gmail.com or 207-899-5367.


the box




turtle cupcakes - normally I might find something like this too sweet, but this was amazing. Sweet, yes (Emily makes her own caramel!) but the nuts helped, and it was sweet in a good way. Interesting textures and simply delicious.


mint chocolate cupcakes - basically tastes exactly like an Andes Mint in frosting form. Made my mouth very happy.




coconut frosting on chocolate cake - the simplest of the cupcakes I tried, a strong but not too strong coconut flavor. Delicious.


chocolate peanut butter cupcake topped with a Reese's peanut butter cup - this is a flavor combination I can never get enough of and the peanut butter frosting basically tasted like peanut butter (salty and thick) in frosting form. Sometimes peanut butter frosting either tastes (or is) literally peanut butter--which I adore, but I think "frosting" should be something more--or is so sweet you lose the peanut buttery-ness. Not so here. This was amazing and worked perfectly with the chocolate and the cake.


bacon! Actually these are Elvis cupcakes (bacon/peanut butter/banana), but I feel like when there's bacon on a cupcake all anyone, including me, sees is the bacon. Case in point: ran into a friend of my friend's at Coffee by Design who immediately was intrigued by the bacon. And it was maple bacon and it was beyond awesome.

My only "complaint," if you can call it that, is that the big cupcakes were gigantic, way too big for me personally, but my friend's husband happily ate more than one of them himself, but I would recommend the mini size because these flavors go a long way.

Peanut Butter Cup Cupcakes

I love these cupcakes for two main reasons. One, they have Reese's peanut butter cups on them. Reese's are by far my favorite candy of all time. I ask for them every year in my Christmas stocking.  And I am currently making a Reese's cake for my friend's birthday tomorrow. I might have to make these cupcakes with the leftover candy. If there is any.

And two, I also love that The Curvy Carrot made the Reese's cups look like the cupcakes they're on. I have seen similar cupcakes on Pinterest, but I like these because the bigger cupcake kind of looks like a Reese's cup too with the black wrapper and chocolate cake. 

For the recipe and directions, head on over to The Curvy Carrot!



Beautiful, Elegant and Pricey French Cupcakes

 Very very very fancy cupcakes by pastry chef Claude Ducrozet, from Hotel Fouquet's Barriere (Paris).

From the PR sheet:

"Cupcakes -- as American as apple pie. But the pastry chef from Paris’ Hotel Fouquet’s Barrière, Claude
Ducrozet, is setting out to change that perception. In October, Claude Ducrozet introduces five flavors of
cupcakes (pictured above): strawberry-lemon, carrot with cream cheese, chocolate, pineapple-mango, and
raspberry pistachio. With French style and flair, each of these creations is a work of art and available from
morning to night – accompanied by coffee, tea, or a cocktail – at the hotel’s elegant Le Lucien Bar. And yes,
they taste as good as they look.
 

Price: 9 € each."

 

 

 

That's about $12 each (with current currency conversion)!

 

Hotel Fouquet’s Barrière 

46 avenue George V  

75008 Paris

33 (0)1 40 69 60 00

Facebook.

Dora the Explorer cupcakes and cake tower

These Dora the Explorer cupcakes and cake/cupcake tower are by Top the Cupcake in Perth, Australia, via Flickr.







I especially appreciate a behind the scenes look at the trials and tribulations of baking. From the post "Dora is so hot right now!":

It was a mammoth effort as those Dora characters were really hard to cut out! Not only were the Dora characters difficult to replicate, but my baking skills were really lacking that morning for some bizarre reason. Perhaps it was because I had no sleep as I was busy making those tricky Dora characters! Actually that is a lie – I had a hour’s power nap across my dining room chairs for an energy boost at 4AM. Anyway, there was something very wrong with my baking that morning. I burnt my vanilla cupcakes and could not get my buttercream frosting to work. My frosting was cluggy and had all these unnecessary lumps in them! To this day, I still do not know the reason behind this. I had sifted the icing twice and the butter was at room temperature. But nevertheless, there were lumps! Bah, it makes me furious just thinking about it.

Ritualistic Cupcakes

I am making up stories in my head about this image. Why is there a big smiley flag? Why are they on a concrete floor? Is this a gallery? What is happening here?! Also, why was I not invited?

Happy birthday.

Image courtesy creative commons licensing and uncleboatshoes.

Proof that cupcakes really are everywhere

As seen at Staples:

And the Cow Says, "Moooo"

Cutie-pie farm animal shots from (appropriately enough) Cutie Cakes WY.

Call For Submissions: Kwanzaa Cupcakes

Hey Gang! I am looking to blog post about Kwanzaa Cupcakes this week. Please send photos, recipes, ideas, and links to CupcakesTakeTheCake AT gmail DOT com with the subject line Kwanzaa by Thursday. Thanks!

Banana Split Cupcakes!

I have always loved the idea of taking completely different desserts and dishes and turning them into cupcakes! For example, bacon and breakfast cupcakes or Starbucks latte inspired cupcakes. I think it's really interesting that some people can recreate those flavors into cute little cupcakes, and the same goes for these precious banana split cupcakes!

These were made by Allie at Cake & Allie. She started with banana cake and mixed in strawberries and pineaple.  They're topped with whipped frosting, chocolate ganache, sprinkles, and a cherry!



Winners!

We had two giveaways recently and the deadlines to enter were last week, so I want to announce the winners:

• Dara E. won Carolyn's Kitchen apron 
• Diana V. won the Smucker's Gift Basket

If you are in the New York City area next Monday, come to our seventh anniversary where we will giving away lots of prizes.

Beautiful cherry almond cupcakes plus recipe link

Find out how to make these cherry almond cupcakes over at North Dakota Kitchen. They look fabulous!

Gingerbread Latte Cupcakes with Recipe Link

Ta ta Thanksgiving, HELLO CHRISTMAS! Now that Thanksgiving and Black Friday have come and gone I think now we can officially start gearing up for Christmas!

In honor of this season's most anticipated holiday I present to you a special Christmas themed treat...Gingerbread Latte Cupcakes with Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting!

These ridiculously cute and delicious looking treats are brought to you by Bakers Royale! The recipe actually came about because of a disappointing Starbucks drink order, goes to show that the best inspiration really can come from anywhere!

I was a little taken aback by the idea of mixed lemon cream cheese with something as spicy as gingerbread but after reading why this was used, I have to say I'm more than curious to try out the recipe for myself. If you want to try this out as well, go ahead and check out the recipe here!

Fun but unusual cupcake flavors

These unusual cupcakes are by New Jersey custom cupcake and cake company Joy & Cake, via their Flickr account. They can be reached at info@joyandcakenj.com. or 732-331-7652.


sweet potato, thyme and pear cupcake


butternut squash and caramel cupcake

And here's a cupcake bouquet in a flower pot:

Cute vanilla snowman cupcakes with only 143.5 calories each

Blogger Gina Homolka at SkinnyTaste serves up recipes that are fun and healthy - even cupcakes! From her about page:

On Skinnytaste, you'll find healthy dishes that don't sacrifice any of the flavor that can be found in their full-fat origins. Gina knows all the food she prepares for Skinnytaste is tasty and satisfying, because after all, this is the same food she cooks on a daily basis for her friends and family, and they are some of her toughest critics!

She caught my eye with these very cute vanilla snowman cupcakes.



The recipe involves Duncan Hines Cake Mix and Chobani yogurt, whose nutritional stats clock in at:

Servings: 24 • Size: 1 cupcake • Old Points: 3 pts • Points+: 4 pts* (3 pts no frosting) Calories: 143.5 • Fat: 2.7 g • Carbs: 27.3 • Fiber: 0 • Protein: 2.1 g • Sugar: 19.6 Sodium: 143.2 mg

And if you just can't get enough, she's got lots more recipes on her site. Here are two of the cupcake ones:


super moist low fat chocolate cupcakes with chocolate glaze


pink lemonade confetti cupcakes

You can also follow SkinnyTaste on Facebook and @SkinnyTaste on Twitter.

Thomas the Tank Enginge cupcakes

Thomas the Tank Engine cupcakes by Zoey Cakes in Baldwinsville, New York, via Flickr. They can be reached at Zoeycakes at gmail.com or 617-320 3590 and you can get more information at zoeycakes.com.

Jabba The Cupcake

courtesy of tumblr

Jabba the...cupcake?! I found this impressive Jabba the Hut cupcake on tumblr and was surprised at how easy it looked to replicate. He looks to be made mostly of frosting with some special attention to coloring detail. Perfect for all Star Wars fans!

Santa, reindeer, melting snowman, woodland creature, cocktail and Steve Jobs cupcake toppers on Etsy

These mostly seasonal cupcakes (the Steve Jobs one was for Halloween, but I had missed it, and the cocktails remind me of New Year's Eve) are for sale by death by cupcake on Etsy, and you can also keep up with them on Flickr.








I can't decide which I think is cutest...maybe the owl?