Cute Cupcake Aprons

For some reason baking cupcakes in a cute apron makes it so much more fun. I love girly, frilly aprons with bows, ruffles, and pockets. Not only are they cute, but they protect your clothes too. They are so functional.

Here are some fun cupcake aprons I found that you can purchase online: 

Frosted Cupcake Apron from Cupcake Swirl. It's so cute!

Baker's Delight Apron from Anthropoloigie. Love Anthro! This apron also made an appearance in Sex and the City 2.

DC Cupcakes Flavors Apron from TLC. If you love Georgetown Cupcake and their TV show, DC Cupcakes, this apron is for you.

Filling Cupcake Liners With Batter

There are several easy ways to fill your cupcake liners with batter; a spoon, a measuring cup, a ice cream scoop, or a pastry bag. You can find examples on filling cups with batter plus lots of other fun tips and tricks on Wilton.com. My favorite way is with an ice cream scoop like the one shown above. When the handle is squeezed it activates a little band that scrapes out the scoop and releases all of the batter inside. I have two different sizes, one for regular sized cupcakes and one for minis. If you watch Cupcake Wars, you'll see most of the competitors use an ice cream scoop. It's just really easy to use and mess free. I bought my scoop at Bed Bath and Beyond.

I think the pastry bag is a pretty genius idea too. I have never tried it before, but think I need to.

Make Your Own Sprinkles Cupcakes

Do you love Sprinkles Cupcakes as much as I do? Unfortunately, I don't live near a Sprinkles and don't get to visit as often as I would like. So, I buy Sprinkles Cupcake mixes at Williams-Sonoma, which are almost just as good as the real thing. You can also buy the mixes on their website. They come in Dark Chocolate, Red Velvet, Vanilla, Banana, and Lemon. They are so easy to make - you just add a couple of ingredients to the dry ingredients provided for you, whip up an easy frosting recipe which is included, and you have yummy Sprinkles Cupcakes. They even come with the Sprinkles signature buttons for the tops of the cupcakes.

Candace Nelson, owner of Sprinkles and judge on Cupcake Wars, has also shared some of her recipes. Here they are:

Sprinkles Cupcakes' Strawberry Cupcakes
Sprinkles Cupcakes' Vanilla-Peppermint Cupcakes

Sprinkles Cupcakes' Peanut Butter Chip Cupcakes (see video)

Red Velvet Cupcakes

I love Red Velvet cupcakes. They are probably my favorite flavor of all cupcakes. They are a rich chocolate cupcake with a cream cheese frosting and they are absolutely delicious. I don't have secret family cupcake recipes, even though I wish I did, I have to find my recipes in cookbooks and online and just try different ones until I find a favorite. 

The Red Velvet cupcake recipe I tried yesterday was really good. It had a nice dark red color, a rich chocolate taste, and the vanilla cream cheese was amazingly good.

I baked them in 2 ounce souffle cups (aka nut cups), which you can just stand on a cookie sheet. I love these because they make the cupcakes a perfect size. I filled them about half-way full which ended up making about 5 dozen cupcakes.

The recipe is by McCormick. Click here to get it.

Kneader's Now Sells Cupcakes

Kneader's Bakery has introduced "The Year Of The Cupcake." They will sell two flavors of cupcakes per month in all of their stores besides all of their other super yummy bakery items. My good friend who works as a head chef at one of our local Kneaders told me that I needed to try one of these super fancy and delicious cupcakes. I stopped by and picked up the White Chocolate Raspberry Truffle cupcake. It was really good. It's an angel food cake dipped in white chocolate with a raspberry filling. The topping is a layer of cream cheese and a raspberry whipped cream frosting. The topping and filling were tart and the cake and white chocolate were sweet, which balanced out the cupcake nicely.

You'll have to stop by and try one for yourself. Again, don't forget to check back every month since the flavors will change.

Hummingbird Cupcakes By Georgetown Cupcake

Recently Sophie and Katherine, owners of Georgetown Cupcake, were on Martha Stewart and shared their recipe for Hummingbird Cupcakes. Hummingbird Cupcakes are a popular southern treat and were given there name because they are so sweet (hummingbirds love sweet nectar). These deliciously rich cupcakes are made with ingredients like bananas, pineapple, and pecans and then topped with a classic cream cheese frosting. Click here for the recipe.

Here are other recipes Georgetown Cupcake have shared:
Chocolate and Vanilla Election Day Cupcakes
Chocolate Ganache Cupcakes
New Year's Eve Strawberry Champagne Sparkler Cupcakes

My Cupcake Supply Store

A couple of people have asked me where I buy my cupcake supplies. I buy them pretty much anywhere - craft stores, grocery stores, etc. But my favorite place to buy supplies is at Orson H. Gygi Co. in Salt Lake City, UT. It's a huge kitchen and culinary supply store and they carry everything from cupcake liners to sprinkles. They have it all. I use a really big tip when I frost cupcakes and this was the only place I could find it. I also buy my souffle cups and madagascar bourbon vanilla here. You can buy any color of melting chocolate, 5 Ibs loafs of carmel, baking pans, cookbooks, cake decorating supplies... and so, so much more. I am telling you, they really have it all. You can buy most of their supplies online by clicking here.

Mini Cupcakes Book Signing

Leslie Fiet, owner of Mini's Cupcakes and author of Mini Cupcakes, will be doing two upcoming book signings in Salt Lake City, UT. So grab your copy of this fabulous cupcake cookbook and head over to meet the author and have your book signed at one of the following events:

When: Thursday, March 24 from 5:00 to 8:00 PM
Where: Mini's Cupcakes, 14 East 800 South

When: Saturday, March 26 at 2:00 PM
Where: The Kings English, 1511 South 1500 East

Even if you can't make it to the book signings, pick up a copy of this cookbook anyway. The recipes are wonderful, the pictures are beautiful, and it's a book you'll want in your collection.

Cupcake Wars Audition Tapes

I have been anxiously awaiting a Utah cupcakery to make an appearance on one of my favorite shows, Cupcake Wars. While looking through audition tapes on YouTube I found several videos from our very own Utah cupcake shops which I am posting for your viewing pleasure. I am so excited that two Utah cupcakes shops are trying out for next season.  

Here are some from 2010 (last season's auditions):

The Sweet Tooth Fairy (6 Utah Locations)

Dippidee (American Fork, UT)

The Cocoa Bean Cupcake Cafe (Provo, UT and 2 Idaho Locations)

Here are audition tapes from 2011 (they are trying out for season 3!):

Mini's Cupcakes (2 Salt Lake City, UT locations)

Cupcake Chic (Orem, UT)

Exciting News From My Favorite Cupcakeries

Cupcake Chic - They now offer Gluten Free Cupcakes. They are delicious whether you have a gluten allergy or not.

Dippidee - Cupcakes With Your Cutie. It's a Mommy and Daughter Night at Dippidee on April 1 at 5:00 pm. See the flyer below for more details. 

Mini's Cupcakes - They are trying out for Cupcake Wars Season 3! This is the best news ever! I have been looking forward to a Utah cupcakery to be on that show. I am crossing my fingers.

Free Cupcakes!

It's Starbucks 40th Anniversary and they are celebrating with FREE CUPCAKES and other petite sweets. If you stop by your local Starbucks between 2 and 5 pm on March 10-12 and purchase a drink they will give you one free Starbucks Petite treat (while supplies last).

The Starbucks Petite's include a Carrot Cake Mini Cupcake and Peanut Butter Mini Cupcake as well as Cake Pops in Birthday Cake (shown above), Rocky Road, and Tiramisu.

Cupcakes And Ice Cream

It seems like one of the hottest new trends right now is to mix cupcakes and ice cream. Yes, like actually mixed together.

The Sweet Tooth Fairy offers what they call CupShakes. They mix a whole cupcake of your choosing, frosting and all, with vanilla soft serve to make it into a creamy delicious shake. This creation was even featured in Woman's Day magazine last fall. The are seriously so delicious. The grasshopper CupShake is amazing!

So Cupcake in Salt Lake City, UT combines two Utah favorites. So Cupcake's cupcakes with Nielsen's Frozen Custard. Any flavor of their cupcakes can be combined with any of Nielsen's Frozen Custard flavors to make So Custard Cupcakes. Yum!

Cupcakes from Cold Stone. They come in Sweet Cream, Cake Batter Delux, and Double Chocolate Devotion (shown above). They are yummy cake mixed with Cold Stone ice cream surrounded by a chocolate shell topped with frosting. They are frozen, sweet deliciousness.

Another popular ice creamery that now carries cupcakes is Maggie Moo's Ice Cream and Treatery. They have fun flavors like Cherry Chocolate, Carrot Cake, Cotton Candy, and Better Batter Cookie Dreams. You have to check them out by clicking here.

Andes Mint Cupcakes

Pin It

Today I made delicious mini Andes Mint cupcakes. I used my Andes Mint cake recipe but made it into cupcakes with buttercream frosting. They were very easy to make because they were made with a boxed cake mix. I would usually prefer to make cupcakes from scratch, but who doesn't love a really easy, delicious recipe once in a while? I do.

First, I will share the cake recipe and then I will let you know what I did to make it into cupcakes. (I do suggest making the cake recipe at least once - it will make you an instant hit. Everyone loves this cake recipe! It is super moist and minty.)

Andes Mint Cake

1 Milk Chocolate Cake Mix
1 Large Package Instant Chocolate Pudding
2 Eggs
1 3/4 Cups Milk
1 Package Andes Mint Chips (divided in half)

Mix the first four ingredients together until blended. Add half of the package of Andes Mint chips into the batter and mix. Bake at 350 degrees for 35-40 minutes. After you remove the cake from the oven, sprinkle the other half of Andes Mint chips onto the cake and spread until even and melted.

Today I mixed the batter as directed above and then filled 35 2-ounce souffle cups (aka nut cups) 1/2 of the way full. If using souffle cups you can just line them up on a cookie sheet since they are strong enough to stand on their own. Tip: To see what I use to fill the souffle cups with batter, click here.

I baked them for about 22-25 minutes at 350 degrees. Keep checking on them and remember when you insert a toothpick and it comes out with chocolate on it - it may just be a melted Andes Mint. Next, I topped them with buttercream frosting (see below) which I added green food coloring to until it was a mint green. Tip: To see how I frost cupcakes, click here. Last, I made the decoration to go on the cupcakes. I melted the remaining Andes Mint chips and put small amounts, about the size of a nickel, on wax paper to harden. Then I melted white chocolate melting chips, then mixed it with green food coloring until it was a mint green, and then spattered it across the hardened Andes Mint pieces (see picture above - since they are not easy to explain).

Buttercream Frosting

1/2 cup Butter (Room Temperature)
2 Tbsp. Milk
1 Tbsp. Vanilla
3 cups Powdered Sugar
Green Food Coloring

They were so delish - really minty, chocolaty, and rich! Enjoy!

Doggie Cupcakes

I was going through some old pictures the other day and came across the ones from our trip to Phoenix, AZ and our first visit to Sprinkles Cupcakes. See the little cupcakes off to the side? They are doggie cupcakes from Sprinkles. Aren't they the cutest? The are sugar-free with a yogurt frosting. My dog, Eddie, loved them.