Cupcakes have certainly progressed from the little tea treats that we used to bake and decorate with Mom. Today's cupcake designs are trendy and stylish, fun and humorous - just whatever takes your fancy. The secret here is to let your imagination run wild.
The following are some tips for:
Those occasions we find ourselves short of time.
• Buy ready made cupcakes from the bakery or supermarket and decorate them yourself.
• Use a ready mix packet to whip up your cupcakes.
• Use an edible writing pen for your designs instead of piping for a quick and easy solution.
• Petal paste (also known as sugar florist paste) is like ready to roll fondant and is a quick and convenient solution if time is an issue. This can be used to cut shapes.
• Pour a lot of sprinkles into a shallow dish and tip your cupcakes upside down into them.
• If you are making bright color designs and cakes make sure you always use natural food coloring as you will be using a lot of the color for brightness.
• Add a generous amount of Tia Maria or Kahlua to your frosting. • Instant coffee or cocoa can be mixed with water to add to your icing.
• Lavender makes a pretty and unique addition to your cupcakes. The flowers can be used for decoration and are edible.
• Rose essence will add a taste of romance. Use pastel colors for the frosting.
• Use different bright colored cupcake cases in three differing sizes and place the completed cupcakes on top of each other to form a pyramid.
Cupcake gifts to take away after the party.
• Use clear circles of cellophane to wrap your cupcake and tie the top with a ribbon.
• Pack your cupcake in a small box.
• Tie a ribbon around the case of the cupcake.
There are many more ideas to use to make your cupcake designs stand out but I hope that these tips have given you food for thought. Enjoy!
Pirate Girl Party Ideas and Accessories - Pretty in Pink! By Jillian Gallo
Plan a Pirate Girl Party using pink party accessories. With Pirate Parties being all the rage today, girls want to get in on the fun and why not, there were, after all female Privateers too. Some of them are just as popular as the dastardly guys we always hear about. Besides, why should boys be allowed to have all the fun? Pirate girl accessories look pretty in pink, but don't let that fool you...these lady buccaneers can be just as tough as the guys. Anne Bonny and Mary Read, two female privateers, would put on men's clothing and fight on the high seas along side of their shipmates.
Send out some pink invitations...with a Skull and Crossbones on them.
Party Plates and Decorations
Pink Pirate accessories are easy to find online. The plates, cups and napkins are pretty in pink with a white skull and crossbones on them. What a lovely table these will set. Finish of your decorations with some pink balloons and some pink and white streamers. Serve your "grog" in Skull Cup, it comes complete with a straw.
Pink Skull Party Favors
Pink Skull party accessories were designed with the lady privateer in mind. A unique party favor is the Grow Your Own Pink Skull! You put the little skull in water and it get bigger...and bigger. These grow your own things are pretty funny. I saw a Pink Skull Coin purse that would be another great favor idea. Your lady buccaneers will be able to put all their bounty in them. There is even a Pink Skull favor kit that includes tons of pirate treasures. The favor box is shaped like a purse and in it you will find lip gloss, cell phone shaped notepad, a gel pen, body crystals, some jewels obviously stolen from some looted ship and a pink skull sticker...any lady buccaneer would say that's a fine pile of loot for a day's work.
Take Party Pictures
Make sure to have your camera ready! You are going to get some great pictures at this party. Make sure to get a "crew" shot and send copies to each guest along with your Thank You cards! Photos are wonderful keepsakes to share.
Play Pirate Games
Find or make up a pirate name for each girl and give your ladies some lessons in pirate talk. Have them give walking the plank a try, fall off and you loose your turn. All you need for this game idea is a 2 X 4. Let each girl walk across it without falling off. It's easy to set up. Don't have a 2 X 4? Just draw lines on a driveway or sidewalk with chalk.
Pink Privateers like pinatas so get one in the shape of a ship. Hang it out in the yard and let the girls jump to pull the string if you got a pull string model, or let them hit it with a stick if you got the regular pinata we are used to. Watch everyone scramble to get the loot when it breaks!
Sing some old buccaneer songs and then let the crew set off on a Treasure Hunt. Print out the maps on pink paper and make the X that marks the spot dark pink or red. Put all the buried treasures in pink foil or paper.
Have a relay race...split the guests into two teams. Set a course they have to follow in the yard and the game is done when each member of one team completes the course. Put a twist on a plain old relay race by adding some Dress Up fun to the game. Get some old clothes and accessories that each team player must put on before running the course! Make it look like a girl pirate costume if you have the clothes to do it. You can always look in a consignment store for a girls costume or buy one on sale from a costume store online.
If you are going to plan a menu for the party give the food some funky names like: Pieces of Eight, Seaweed Salad, Shipwreck Soup and Buccaneer Buns...make labels so everyone can share the theme idea. For you final act of the day finish off the fun with some pink frosted cupcakescupcakes as usual, frost them with pink icing and draw a Skull and Crossbones on them with a tube of white decoratorcupcake. Cupcakes designs are easy to make and the mini cakes are so very easy to serve. Now send your tired crew home to their own ships...AARRGG.
Scrapbooking is a popular trend among women, young and old. Their creative sides are brought out and treasured moments are made beautifully hand-crafted. There are so many fun ways that you can embellish your scrapbooks, and one idea that you might consider is putting in 3D flowers. This guide can show scrapbookers how to make flowers out of cupcake holders.
Purchase some patty pans (cupcake holders). Make a visit to the craft store or the baking section of your local market and look out for the small sized cupcake holders - it is ok to use bigger ones too. Shop around until you find paper cupcake pans that you really like the look of. Also buy some white ones the same size as the first ones you get. You'll have to decorate the white ones yourself if you only buy white. You can purchase pre-patterned cupcake holders, which may be simpler.
Figure out the size you want for the petals. The cupcake holders you can buy in the store have small ridges on their sides. Remember as a kid, scraping out the last of the cake with your teeth? Those ridges on the cupcake holder will make a big difference to your next scrapbooking page. You will want to count how many ridges wide each petal is going to be. You can vary your petal sizes to suit your preference.
Make cuts to shape your cupcake holder into a flower. This is the only active thing you have to do for these flowers - so simple! While remembering to space your cuts according to your preferred size of petals, cut out some petal shapes. If you want your petal to be 2 ridges wide, then that is where to cut each peak in your cup cake holder.
These cuts should be made from the top, around, and down to the bottom of the cupcake holder.
Consider overlapping the scrapbook flowers. To get a multi-dimensional look, try extra layers of flowers - just glue more than one design on top of another to make a really impressive display in your scrapbook.
Attach. So now that you have your flowers done, you need to place them in the scrapbook. You can just stick the flower to the page or card with some glue. Then you can use a button or stamp to decorate the center or even curl some of the petals of your cupcake flower to make something really pretty and unique!
Cupcakes For Dessert - Baking on a Budget By Tina Graham and Cheri Brown
Cupcakes are a budget friendly and delicious dessert option in these trying economic times. They are easy on the finances because many recipes require ingredients that many people already have in their pantry. In addition, recipes can easily be cut in half or extras from a full batch can be individually wrapped and frozen to be saved for a later date. Most recipes make 18 to 24 portions, so set aside the needed amount and freeze the rest of the (unfrosted and individually wrapped) mini cakes and frosting in airtight containers to be used at another time.
If you are preparing your dessert ahead of time, store your cupcakes in an airtight container in the refrigerator up to 24 hours ahead of time. Frozen cakes and separately frozen frosting can be defrosted (on counter for one to two hours) and prepared when needed. They will keep well frozen for 1 to 2 weeks. Note that, after defrosting, the icing or frosting may be slightly crystallized or unsmooth. Beat the frosting with a mixer at a medium speed until it is back to the desired consistency.
Providing an enticing dessert can be stressful but, it doesn't need to be. Does this sound familiar? It is 2:30 in the afternoon, you need to pick up kids from school, get one to piano and another to soccer practice. Then, you need to vacuum, set the table, pick up kids, get the kids an early dinner, and make yourself look perfect, calm and relaxed all before your guests come at 6:30. The one thing you do not need to worry about is your daringly delicious dessert because you made it yesterday!
Today's tastes are grown-up, fun and elegant. Select a cupcake that is appropriate for the type of entertaining: Enjoying an afternoon tea with friends? Lemon treats always go well with tea. Having a luncheon? Wow your guests with little Peach Melba cakes! Putting on a formal affair? Dress up with a black bottom treat. Entertaining with Italian food? How about one with a cannoli filling? Delizioso! And who doesn't love cheesecake? Dress up mini cheesecakes with chocolate or caramel for an evening event or fruit on a sunny afternoon.
Want something that is more traditional? Turn a simple recipechocolate over it or embedding your favorite chocolate candy inside. The possibilities are endless.
There is a fit for every occasion. Plus, your guests will never feel that they are over indulging because the dessert is perfectly proportioned. Cupcakes are fun, elegant and delicious making them the ideal dessert for all types of entertaining. into a special treat by topping it with fruit, drizzling rich dark
Get a Cupcake Stand For Your Next Party By Jon McQuade
Have you ever made cupcakes for a party or event and had really no place to put those delicious little cakes of heaven. Most people place them on normal plate and set them on the table with all the other food and treats, but there's one problem with that you can only fit so many on a plate and you constantly replenishing the plate because those delicious cupcakes are just so popular. Would you love to find a solution for that so you can occupy your precious time on something else during your party? Here is the perfect solution and bet you never thought of it or even new they existed, the cupcake stand. Cupcake stands come in many different shapes and sizes to pretty much suit and type of party or venue you may choose those to have.
Birthday parties are just not complete without dozens of those wonderfully decorated and delicious cupcakes covered in all sorts of frostings. Why not let your cupcakes stand out in the party and join them with a cupcake stand. There are many styles and sizes of cupcake stands, if you want one for just a half a dozen cupcakes or one for 30 to 40. Cupcake stands work perfect for your party, they make it easy for the kids to grab, there easy to setup and put cupcakes in. the best of all cupcake stands make your party look good.
Birthday parties are not the only event for a cupcake stand, nor is it the only place to enjoy cupcakes. Those wonderful little treats find themselves everywhere form bakeries to baby showers. Talking about baby shower there's a good Idea! Cupcake stands are very popular at baby showers. You have to advertise the Pink or the Blue at the party and what a better way than with a large cupcake stand filled with pink or blue cupcakes.
Many cake designers love to work with cupcake stands because they make for such great decorating ideas for Weddings. You can have 3 to 4 tiers of very decorated cupcakes to extenuate a beautiful cake on the top. This design is use a lot a weddings and has come to be a pretty good suit for designers also.
By now you're probably coming up with all these wonderful ideas for your next party or event. You will find cupcake stands designed for just about any need you have and sometimes there pretty easy to make. They usually come to fit 8,12,24,30 cupcakes and fit more on the bottom then tier up to fit one on the top. Some are designed with little pockets to drop the cupcake in and others have circular shelves. Witch ever you choose makes sure to pick the right shape and size for the situation your having and don't forget to make as many cupcakes and possible because you don't want to buy a cupcake stand that holds 38 cupcakes and you only make 20 that would look pretty funny. And remember anytime you advertise your cupcakes on a cupcake stand they don't last long. So make as many as you can.
Cupcakes have certainly progressed from the little tea treats that we used to bake and decorate with Mom. Today's cupcake designs are trendy and stylish, fun and humorous - just whatever takes your fancy. The secret here is to let your imagination run wild.
• If you are making bright color designs and cakes make sure you always use natural food coloring as you will be using a lot of the color for brightness.
