"Ace Hardware" Cupcakes for Chris 2/2013

Chris...who is a friend of my family was going to be attending a managers meeting for Ace Hardware and asked me to create some cupcakes for him. He asked for red cupcakes with white frosting and the Ace Hardware logo. So I made red velvet cupcakes with vanilla buttercream and hand cut each letter to resemble to Ace logo. Unfortunately I don't have the letter fondant cutters yet so they weren't all exactly the same, but they were pretty darn close! Chris said that everyone loved them! Love getting positive feedback!! :)

Peanut Butter Explosion Cake for Liz 1/2013

My monthly cake customer Liz asked me to make the same cake I made my husband and brother for their birthday last year except in a sheet cake form. The only difference was that she wanted peanut butter cake (previous version was two tier with the top tier being chocolate cake and the bottom cake was vanilla). So this cake was a 1/4 sheet with peanut butter cake, peanut butter frosting, chocolate ganache and crumbled peanut butter cups on top. According to her son (friends with my little brother), everyone went crazy over the cake! :)

Bridal Shower "Derby" Cupcakes for Michelle

My cousins fiance was having a Kentucky Derby themed bridal shower and her made of honor asked me to make her cupcakes. She had sent me a recipe she found online when doing a search for Derby things. The only think I omitted was the pie crust, I had to travel from North Port to Orlando (about 3.5 hours) with these and that was hard enough. I didn't want to add in the standing up pie crust because I figured they wouldn't hold up for the ride! Below is the recipe I used to make these...they were really yummy, almost taked like cookie dough cupcakes. I made a combo of mini cupcakes and standard size cupcakes.

Cupcake:

3 cups all purpose flour

2 t baking powder
1/2 t salt
1 cup unsalted butter at room temperature
2 1/4 C packed light brown sugar
4 large eggs
3/4 c buttermilk
1/2 c finely chopped pecans
1/2 c mini chocolate chips
1 t vanilla

Garnish:

1 refrigerated pie crust

mini chocolate chips
chopped pecans

Icing:

8 oz cream cheese at room temperature

1/2 c unsalted butter at room temperature
1 c brown sugar
1 pound powdered sugar
1 t vanilla

Preheat the oven to 325. Line muffin tins with cupcake liners

Cupcakes: Cream butter and brown sugar until smooth. Add eggs one at a time. Sift together flour, salt & baking powder in separate bowl. Add half of the buttermilk to the egg/sugar mixture. Add half of the dry ingredients. Add other half of buttermilk then other half of the dry ingredients. Mix well. Add vanilla.

Mix in chocolate chips and finely chopped pecans until just combined.

Scoop out into cupcake liners (about 3/4 full) and bake for 20-25 minutes.

Cool.

 

Lay out refrigerated pie crust on a cookie sheet and poke with a fork several times. Cook according to package directions until just golden brown. Break into large pieces.

 

Frosting: cream together cream cheese, butter and brown sugar. Beat until well combined. Add 1 lb of powdered sugar slowly until all is combined. Add vanilla.

After the cupcakes are cooled, frost (I used a star icing tip and a piping bag to frost them). Garnish with a chopped pecans, mini chocolate chips, 1 large piece of pie crust. Sprinkle more crumbled pie crust on top.

 

Baby Shower Mini Cupcakes 1/2013

My friend Emily asked me if I could maje 60 Mini cupcakes for a baby shower she was going to be attending. She wanted Vanilla and Chocolate cake with Vanilla and Chocolate Buttercream! She said they were a big hit! :)