Super delicious birthday cookies

 

Top birthday cakes for our kids

 

 

Top birthday cakes for our kids

 

 

birthday cakes for our kids

 

 

birthday cakes for our kids

 

 

Cheap birthday cakes choice

 

 

Cheap birthday cakes choice

 

 

so sweet birthday cakes

 

 

so sweet birthday cakes

 

A fun video on how to make owl cupcakes by What's New, Cupcake? and Hello, Cupcake! authors Karen Tack and Alan Richardson; see their website for more cupcake fun.

These cute tiger cupcakes, with hand-painted fondant toppers, are by PJ'S Baby Cakes in Lincoln, Nebraska, via Flickr. Visit pjsbabycakes.com for ordering information.



And unrelated but beautiful love cupcakes:

I love it when a viral video inspires cupcake creativity! Meaghan from the blog, Clutzy Cooking. sent in a picture of her "Double Rainbow" cupcakes.

Over at The Awl a few weeks ago, Jolie Kerr told us how to make margarita cupcakes with tequila shooter toppers! Those are pictured below, and apparently, very popular. She writes:

The recipe for margarita cupcakes is built around a white cake mix with a whole bunch of add-ins. Normally I wouldn’t advocate for the use of boxed cake mixes because, really, how hard is it to mix together flour, sugar, baking soda and salt? That’s pretty much what a cake mix is, but also are you really going to trust that the fine folks at Betty Crocker aren’t cutting their cake mixes with laxatives and baby powder? Right, do it yourself, if only to ensure that your cake mix is as pure as possible and the DEA isn’t going to bang down your door to confiscate your Sachertorte.

For the sake of this recipe though, it’s fine to use a boxed mix and here’s why: This is not the simplest cake to make. It's not hard, it's just got a number of steps and also? We’re hardly talking about fine pastry here. We’re going to shoot tequila off the tops of these cupcakes, so I think we can all agree to relax our standards a bit.



And Village Voice food blog Fork in the Road lets us know about a New York margarita cupcake coming up from Robicelli's:

Robicelli's will be hawking its latest cocktail cupcake -- or caketail -- creations at Joe the Art of Coffee locations February 21 and 22 in honor of National Margarita Day.

Robicelli's Partida Margarita Cupcake is a lime cake infused with Partida Blanco tequila and lime butter cream, and garnished with candied lime zest and Maldon flake sea salt. The Angry Mango Cupcake is made with chili-spiked Partida Reposado tequila and topped with mango butter cream and a sweet-salty jalapeño slice.

See robicellis.com for more information and to keep up with their innovative new flavors.

I first discovered this recipe when I used it to make a chocolate cake with peanut butter frosting and have been addicted ever since. It's my go-to recipe for anything that requires chocolate cake, including these mini cupcakes.

If you aren't looking to make 10 dozen mini cupcakes, you can always bake as regular sized cupcakes (this recipe will make about 3 dozen), just bake for 15-20 minutes instead.

Mini Chocolate Cupcakes
Adapted from Sugar Cooking and Smitten Kitchen

Makes about 10 dozen mini cupcakes

2 cups all-purpose flour
2 1/2 cups sugar
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup vegetable oil
1 cup sour cream (I used a scant cup)
1 1/2 cups water, room temperature
2 tablespoons distilled white vinegar
1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 eggs, room temperature

Preheat oven to 350°F. Line mini cupcake tins with paper liners.

Sift together flour, sugar, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt into a large bowl. After sifting, use a whisk to completely combine the dry ingredients. Add the oil and sour cream and whisk well to combine until they are incorporated. Gradually beat in the water, the batter will start to get very wet at this point. Add the vinegar and vanilla and continue whisking. Make sure you are getting everything well incorporated and there aren't any lumps. Finally, whisk in eggs until combined.

Divide the batter evenly among the paper liners, filling each about 2/3 full and bake for 7-10 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Cool for about a minute in the pan before moving to a wire rack to cool completely. I recommend chilling these cupcakes before serving because they are incredibly moist and tend to stick to the wrapper until they have set a little bit.

When completely cool, top with your favorite frosting (I used this cinnamon cream cheese frosting above).

Here's a round up of the cupcakes that Trophy Cupcakes sold in their Seattle shops for Valentine's Day! Aren't they so super cute?

For more about Trophy, visit their website!

These beautiful cupcakes transcend Valentine's Day. They're all from the Flickr account of Sweet Scarlet Cakes & Cupcakes - go there to see lots more beautiful cupcakes.

Yesterday I had coffee with Andrea of High Low Food Drink. She mentioned that she made cupcake wrappers, and wrote about how to make them on her blog.  Cupcake wrappers are great way to decorate cupcakes for parties and special events. Be sure to wait until after cupcakes cool to apply wrappers.

 

So sweet cakes for our kids birthday

 

 

So sweet cakes for our kids birthday

 

 

birthday cakes for kids

 

 

birthday cakes for kids

 

 

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