Cupcake Saturday!

Happy Saturday! We hope everyone is having a great weekend! We are using our first weekend of fall decorating the apartment a little and catching up on sleep (a lot!) We also decided to spend a little time in the kitchen and our favorite day of the week is making a comeback! We originally had another project planned that was supposed to be posted, but this is much better! The other night we were in the mood for some cupcakes and so we went with it. These little sweeties are pretty much fall in a cupcake!

These are our vanilla pumpkin mousse cupcakes with cinnamon cream cheese frosting. We found an absolutely delish recipe for pumpkin curd, which is pretty much pumpkin, sugar, and butter (how can you go wrong?!) It's definitely one of those foods you can eat out of the jar with a spoon. Or a finger. The only thing that would make it better? Whipped cream mixed into it to make a mousse. The cupcakes are filled with this mousse. They are then topped with a basic cream cheese frosting, kicked up with a bit of cinnamon. They're a little "messy", but totally worth it! These pair quite well with some of the curd mixed into some freshly brewed coffee to make a pumpkin spice latte. It sounds like quite a bit of pumpkin, but it definitely isn't, especially in fall!
Thanks so much for stopping by! Enjoy the weekend!

Cupcake Saturday!

Welcome back to Cupcake Saturday!! It has been quite a while since we've made cupcakes, and they were totally missed. O our first Saturday back, we made a cupcake perfect for Valentine's Day. These are strawberry cream cheese cupcakes:

They are strawberry cupcakes, with bits of strawberries in the batter. Each is filled with a little of the cream cheese frosting, and topped off with some more. Luckily, we didn't make a lot of them because they were all gone in a few days (although there was a tiny bit of help eating them).
Thanks for stopping by! Have a wonderful day!

Cupcake Saturday!

Happy Saturday! We know it's been a while since we've popped on here, and now it's late (still Saturday, though, so it's all good!) It's been a crazy few weeks. There have been lots of random projects to work on and short afternoons after work. Unfortunately, we haven't been able to work on many of our own projects. Anyway, today's post is a cupcake in honor of the last (unofficial) weekend of fall- everyone knows that Thanksgiving weekend is the official start of the Christmas season! (Yep, it has it's own season!!) So, here they are:

These are our 'fall leaves' cupcakes. They are chocolate cupcakes with toffee bits baked inside. They are frosted with a green buttercream.

The trees were made with melting chocolate. They were a little hard to make- trees can be tough to draw, let alone make them with chocolate. We added some colorful sprinkles to them before they were set. Then we stuck them into the center of the cakes and added more sprinkles to the frosting. From the pictures, it's a bit hard to see, but some of the sprinkles are actually blue. We are fully aware that there aren't any blue leaves- but that would be pretty awesome! These would be a pretty cute addition to any fall-themed party.
Thanks so much for stopping by today! Have an amazing day!

Cupcake Saturday!

Happy Saturday! We hope everyone has had a wonderful weekend so far. It seems as if this weekend will be a good time to be outside, see some color, and enjoy the weather. Hopefully. As long as it's nicer than last weekend, it's a winner! And we'll probably spend it inside...crafting. Oh well. We've been rather busy with orders. We finished two yesterday and have another three to work on now.
We have another cupcake to share with you today. It is an apple crisp cupcake:

We were having a discussion on whether it should be considered a cupcake or a muffin. The jury is still out, but under either title, they're delicious! One of our mom's favorite (and yummiest) things to make during the fall is apple crisp. We decided to make this one in honor of her. It has huge chunks of apples, to really get the flavor. They also help keep the cupcake nice and moist. We decided to top it off with a batch of crumb topping. We were always known to be the ones who would pick the biggest "crumbs" off the pies and crisps, and anything else that you could put it on. This was no exception! (We made a small cake and topped it with a good inch of the crumble, and then proceeded to pick off the top.)

These cupcakes would be perfect for those days when you are looking for a treat, but not something overly sweet. And it has fruit in it, so they have to be good for you, no?!
Thanks so much for stopping by! We hope you all have a great day!

Cupcake Saturday!

Happy Saturday! We hope everyone has had a wonderful work week. We are definitely looking forward to the weekend, even if it’s filled with a ton of work to do! At least we have a few more days of sun and warmer temperatures before the rainy season is upon us. Anyway, since it is Saturday, we have another cupcake to share. Today’s cupcake is a very fall-inspired one: Pumpkin-stuffed vanilla cupcakes, with a pumpkin spice buttercream.

 

These are a basic vanilla cupcake filled with a little pumpkin-y surprise! These are like our valentine’s day cupcakes a while back, with a heart in the middle. The pumpkin cake is a pumpkin-spice bread mix, cut into the shape of a pumpkin. Or, what is supposed to be a pumpkin. All of our cookie cutters were much too big, so we had to cut them by hand. I guess they don’t look too shabby, for paper and a knife. The basis for the frosting is a basic recipe. However, instead of using cream and vanilla for the liquid, we had some pumpkin-spice liqueur in the fridge, so we used that. We didn’t use so much that it’s over-powering, but just enough to taste it. To top them off, we sprinkled them with a bit of pumpkin-pie spice and cinnamon-and-sugar.

Thanks so much for stopping by! Have a wonderful weekend!

Cupcake Saturday (on Sunday again)

Good afternoon! We hope everyone is having a wonderful weekend so far. We've finally (maybe) got over our super early morning the other day and got back to work on our projects. So, like we said yesterday, our Cupcake Saturday was pushed back a day. Today's treat is a jelly-filled donut cupcake.

These are cinnamon-sugar and vanilla cupcake, topped dipped in a cinnamon-sugar mixture. Once they were cooled, we cored them out and filled them with jam. They can be filled with any type of jam. These were filled with a huckleberry jam (which was surprisingly delicious!) but a strawberry would probably be awesome, too! And paired with a cup of coffee, these would be a perfect breakfast, in our opinion : D
Thanks for stopping by and joining us today. Enjoy!

Cupcake Saturday!

Good morning on this absolutely gorgeous Saturday morning! We hope everyone is having a great day so far! Ours is looking to be busy, but hopefully we'll be able to relax a little tomorrow. Anyway, the cupcakes we are sharing with you today are the ones we made for our birthday last weekend. At the beginning of May, as we were watching the Harry Potter Weekend on ABC Family for the umpteenth time, we decided that we really wanted to have a Harry Potter themed birthday this year. Honestly, who wouldn't want to live in a world full of magic and mystery?! (And who says 27 is too old for a birthday party?!) We had a whole bunch of ideas to work with , but unfortunately, life got in the way and we didn't get around to it. But, we did make cupcakes to celebrate! These are our butterbeer cupcakes, in honor of Harry Potter:

We took a shortcut with these, and used a butter cake mix. Instead of adding water, we added cream soda to the batter (it was kind of difficult to find the cream soda. Not too many stores out here sell it. Who knew??) Once the cupcakes were cooled, we took white buttercream frosting and added a package of butterscotch pudding to it. We mixed it to make a butterscotch buttercream. (This would probably have been better looking if it was a homemade frosting, but it tastes delicious!) These were exactly what I would imagine a mug of butterbeer to taste like.
If the cupcake form isn't quite your thing, there are a ton of other recipes out there for drink versions. We've tried the one from this website, which was surprisingly good. It's not the heathiest drink out there, and drinking a tablespoon of butter may not be on your top list of things to do, but it is tasty in small portions. (That's in the mug.) We also found a butterbeer frappuccino 'recipe' here for the coffee drinker who frequents the corner Starbucks. I wonder if the one at Safeway would make this for us. There are also cream soda-based recipes, too.
Thanks so much for stopping by! Have a magical day!!

Cupcake Satuday!!

We're back! It has been a few weeks since we've had the time to make some cupcakes. But, between work and orders and everything else that seems to take up our time, we found a few minutes to make these! This week's cupcakes are Nutella cupcakes with strawberry jelly frosting.

 These are kind of a mix between two recipes. The cupcakes are chocolate cupcakes with Nutella mixed in. I was a little surprised when they came out because there wasn't much of a Nutella-y flavor to them, even though I added more than the original recipe called for. But it might have added to the softness of the cupcakes. A lot of other recipes pipe some Nutella into the middle of the cupcakes, but I'd rather just eat it out of the jar (as you can kind of tell). Once the cupcakes cooled, we topped them with a strawberry jelly buttercream. This was a definite risk, but I think it worked out. It was a lot sweeter than we would normally make, but it balances out the cupcake nicely, especially if you make a sandwich out of the cupcake.
Anyway, we hope everyone has a wonderful weekend, and that you get to do something fun and exciting! Thanks for stopping by!!

Cupcake Saturday!

Good morning! Unfortunately, it's been a few days since we've posted. We have been pretty busy with other projects that our blog has been a little quiet. We've been busily working on a set of wedding invitations (off of Etsy, which is super exciting because it's someone we don't actually know!) and apparently everyone and their father enjoys superheroes and have birthdays coming up. And, on top of that, we spend today working on some DIY tutorials we'll share in the upcoming days. However, since today is Saturday, we have a cupcake to share with you!
I don't know about elsewhere, but it was pretty nice here today. The sun was shining brightly and there wasn't a raindrop in sight! It was a bit chilly, though, but that's what layers are for! After the few days of rain we had this week, it was most definitely a welcome sight. It was one of those days that gets you ready for spring. Because of this spring weather, we decided to make a 'spring-y' cupcake for today. These are lemon cupcakes, filled with a lemon curd, and topped off with a mixed berry buttercream frosting.

We used fresh lemons (and some bottled lemon juice) for the cupcakes and filling, and a mix of freshly-unfrozen mashed berries, including blueberries and raspberries. With all the fruit in these, they have to be good for you, right?!
Thanks for stopping by! Join us tomorrow for one of our DIY projects!

Cupcake Saturday!

Welcome to another Cupcake Saturday! We hope everyone is enjoying their weekend. We've been having absolutely gorgeous weather- just chilly enough to remind you it's still February, but sunny enough to not miss all of the rain! And on top of it, we have seen the first flowers of spring! There's a little patch of crocuses that popped up at the park.
Anyway, for today's cupcake, we were inspired by the warmer weather. Although summer is still months away, this cupcake reminds us of summer.

These are our "coffee-shop inspired" mocha coconut cupcakes. As residents of this great state, we might be one of a few that would prefer a coffee from Dunkin Donuts, but since we don't have any here (unfortunately) we work with what we have. This drink is probably our favorite warm-weather drink, and on our road trip a few summers ago, it was pretty much how we got all of our calories in (along with our peanut butter and jelly sandwiches out of the trunk).
These cupcakes are chocolate with a hint of coffee. We were kind of nervous when we made the batter because the coffee flavor was too strong. Luckily, the flavor mellowed out a bit once they were baked. There is also some coconut in the batter. Once they were cooled, we topped them with some lightly-sweetened whipped cream, toasted coconut, and drizzled with some melted dark chocolate. They may not taste just like the drink, but they're excellent, none the less! And even if you're not a fan of coffee, the topping is good on its own!!
Thanks for stopping by!!

Cupcake Saturday!

Yay! It's finally Saturday! We hope everyone has had a wonderful week. It's been pretty chilly and foggy here all week, but it isn't snow, so it's OK. (Although we still hope for those snow days.) We are definitely looking forward to this three-day weekend. So, since it is (still) Saturday, we have a new cupcake to share with you. This is Valentine's Day-inspired cupcake, with some strawberries and lots of chocolate, and a nice surprise. You'd be sure to get on anyone's good side with these.

 

There is so much chocolate in these little guys. They are a chocolate cake, with a dark chocolate frosting, and a chocolate-covered strawberry on top! The surprise is in the wine we used. I don't know if anyone has tried this, but it is called 'Chocovine', which is chocolate wine. It's like a grown-up chocolate milk. We used some in the batter and the frosting. And another surprise is found inside the cupcake:

 

They are filled with a strawberries and cream mixture. It is a lightly sweetened whipped cream, with strawberries folded in.

How delicious do these cupcakes look?? They can get the attention of that special someone, or they are can just cause a 'death by chocolate'.
Thanks so much for stopping by! Have a wonderful (long) weekend!!

Cupcake Saturday!

Happy Fall! It's official! The best season of the year is here- holiday season! Now that Fall is here, that means that it's (past) time to think about Halloween and Thanksgiving. And, of course Christmas gets included since most of the prep time for the holiday actually falls during Fall! I don't know if you can tell, but we get really excited at this time of year!
OK, enough rambling. Time to get to our favorite day of the week- Cupcake Saturday! Seeing as today is the first day of Fall, we thought we would make today's cupcake based off our favorite drink. One thing Washington is knwn for is Starbucks. One of the best thing about Starbucks? They're pumpkin lattes. Unfortunately, they are a little expensive to have too many of them, so today's cupcake is a Pumpkin Latte cupcake:

Oh, they could be twins...These are pumpkin cupcakes, with just a hint of coffee flavor (I know a latte has espresso in it, so it's not quite a latte, but you can't taste too much of it in the drink anyway.) We topped it with some whipped cream, a little caramel drizzle, and a sprinkle of cinnamon! These cupcakes taste about as close to the real thing as you can get!

Thanks for stopping by today! Join us tomorrow, when we start a new theme for the week.

Cupcake Saturday!

Happy Saturday! I hope everyone had a nice, shortened week, and are enjoying their weekend so far. I know it's still early. Looks like we'll be having some rain this morning, but it's supposed to clear up for the rest of the day and tomorrow. I'll take 65degrees and a little rain, over 75 degrees, 96% humidity any day!!
Back to the important things! Since it was our parents' birthdays this past week, and we weren't able to make them a cake, we based Cupcake Saturday choice to "honor" our Mom (Sorry Dad!) She was born in Germany and came here when she was a young tike. So the two choices were German Chocolate or Black Forest, and the more-tastier of the two would be the Black Forest. (I also recall her saying she was born in the Black Forest region, but I can't remember for sure.) So, here are today's cupcakes:

 Like the traditional German desert, the cupcakes are chocolate and filled with cherries. They are topped with whipped cream, and finished off with some chocolate shavings and a cherry on top! they are very moist (as you can probably tell in the first cupcake), so they don't cut quite as nice.

Technically, these are more "American", since they do not contain alcohol. A "true" German Black Forest contains Kirschwasser (a cherry liquor known here as Kirsch). This is a liquor from the Black Forest region of Germany, hence the name. But they're still delicious!!

Thanks for looking and have a wonderful weekend!!

Today's Party Trivia:
- In 1692, the first accused "witch" in the Salem Witch Trials went on trial. Apparently she may have been confused with someone else. In the end, she was found guilty anyway.
- P.T. Barnum started his first circus tour today in 1835.
- The radio was patented in 1896.

Everyone Deserves Birthday Wishes...

...Even the Grouchiest of us all!! Who knew that today as Oscar the Grouch's birthday?! I found out yesterday and thought I would share! After wondering what a guy who lives in a garbage can would want for his birthday, I decided on cookies (don't tell Cookie Monster...) I had been looking on-line to find some recipes that would capture the "essence" of the Grouch. If you Google "garbage cookies", there are actually quite a few recipes. I know it sounds nasty, but they're very similar to "monster cookies". They are pretty much oatmeal cookies with extra mix-ins. You can make them with pretty much anything you have on hand. Here is my take on these. I don't know what to call them, since I'm not a huge fan of the "garbage cookie" name...

See how happy he is someone remembered his birthday?? And then he got all grouchy because he's older... These are an oatmeal-based cookie, with some peanut butter, chocolate chips, and some cereal. They are actually much better than they look, but since I thought I would be clever and add some mini marshmallows, it was a mess. They are actually really good...but then again, you can't really go wrong with oatmeal, chocolate and peanut butter. (Unless it's all mixed in together for breakfast and it's really dry..) I wonder if he'll share with his pal Slimey.

Cupcake Saturday

Well, it's a little more than a cupcake. It's a whole cake today! What kind of Alice in wonderland birthday party wouldn't have a cake?! And since our birthday is tomorrow, we needed a cake anyway. So here it is, our Un-Birthday cake. (I have to say, it's probably the most elaborate cake we've ever had for our birthday. OK, it IS the most elaborate.) I think it looks pretty good for being amateurs. So glad we figured out the best ways to use our Cricut Cake machine. (Remember our carrot cupcakes? The carrots didn't look so hot...)
Can't wait for all of the possibilities for Cupcake Saturday!

I think we got everything or part of everyone in. Well, we had planned to. Cheshire Cat and White Rabbit didn't make it. There was a lot less room than we thought there would be! Which is a good thing, because it means less cake to eat. We made the top layer Alice's dress and bow, both of which came out pretty well, I think. And before I forget, I bet you're wondering what kind of cake it is. It's a White Chocolate Strawberry cake: white chocolate cake, strawberry filling, and white chocolate butter cream frosting. I hope it lasts until tomorrow!


It's been a wonderful week in Wonderland. We hope you had as much fun as we did!

I also decided to (try) to enter this into a challenge at Bitten by the Bug 2. I know it's a little outside of the box for a challenge, but I figured that since it was made in the kitchen, using the Cricut Cake, that it was worth a shot!

Today’s Party Trivia:
- The first witch hanging took place today in 1647, in Hartford, Connecticut.
- In 1783, the town of North Stratford (now Trumbull) celebrated "A Great Jubilee Day". It was held to celebrate the end of fighting in the Revolutionary War. It is considered a precursor to today's Memorial Day celebrations. (How cool is that?!)
- Bram Stoker's Dracula was first published today in 1897.

Cupcake Saturday!

Here's our first post for Cupcake Saturday! Hopefully we will be able to continue it for a while!! This weekend, we made "Sweet Vanilla" cupcakes. They have just the right amount of sweetness to them without being too overpowering. They are frosted with a buttercream frosting and topped with a chocolate drizzle and sprinkles!

Fall Cupcakes

We spent today making some delicious cupcakes. The first batch we made were apple spice. They had tons of apples in them, but their tops sunk a little, so they weren't quite as nice as we would have liked. We made a caramel cream cheese icing to put on top. We also made a batch of pumpkin cupcakes. In years past, we tried making pumpkin cupcakes, but there were probably the best tasting ones yet! These were topped with an almond cream cheese frosting. We then topped each with an apple and pumpkin cut-out, so we could tell which was which!

The first picture is of the apple spice batter. It was nice and thick, with chunks of apple! The second is the finished product.

The first picture is of the pumpkin cupcakes, right out of the oven. The second is the same ones, all dressed up!

Happy Mother's Day!

Just wanted to say Happy Mother's Day to the best mom in the world!

The outside reads, "Make Gnome Mistake..."

The inside reads, "You're the Best!"

 

 

This was our attempt at making a watering can cake to go with the gnome/garden theme. The spout was just a little too heavy, so we had to keep the can there. Hopefully next time, we'll get it right without having to keep anything up with cans!

Finally, our gift basket of gnome and garden things!

Making the Most of Another Snow Day

As of today, we have had our 10th snow day. Three of them since Tuesday. To make the most of it, we decided to spend some time in the kitchen. Just like our last snow day. We continued to work on different cupcakes to add to our repertoire. We tried to make six different varieties, all of which were delicious, I must say!!

Up first: CHERRY CHOCOLATE CHIP

This is a chocolate cake, with chocolate chips and cherry chunks in the mix. It is topped with a cherry buttercream, and, of course, a cherry on top!

Next: ORANGE CHOCOLATE WITH GANACHE

This doesn't look like much from the picture, but it is a chocolate cake with chocolate chunks, along with orange liqueur. The ganache also has a hint of orange in it.

Next: PINA COLADA

 

Thinking of summer!! This variety is a vanilla cake flavored with rum and pineapple juice. It is topped with a pineapple frosting, with shredded coconut, pineapple chunks, and a cherry.

Next: WATERMELON SPRITZER

 

This is a watermelon cake with a 7-Up frosting. Simple, but delicious!



Next: CRANBERRY LIME

 

This cupcake is a cranberry-lime flavored cake, topped with a cranberry rum buttercream.

And last, but not least, STRAWBERRY DAIQUIRI

This cupcake has a strawberry banana mix, with a strawberry rum flavored filling. The frosting is also rum flavored.

It was a fun snow day, to say the least! Two of the best ways to spend a few snowy days!! Now it's back to reality and back to school. On a good note, it's Friday, on the bad note, another storm is on the way. We shall see what happens!!