Cure for swine flu!

These cupcakes have no medicinal value, but one daily will at least make you smile!

So many people have got swine flu here in Sydney that I thought I would make some cupcakes to represent the flu! Of course, the pigs on the cupcakes aren't really swine...more like little piggies.

I was inspired after watching this youtube video. I made vanilla cupcakes from the Hummingbird Bakery cookbook and used fondant for the tops. I used pink writing icing for the eyes and mouths.

Cardamon, Carrot and Cashew Cupcakes

We're having Indian tonight. The Butter Chicken is in the slow cooker, the Lamb Khee is going on when the distinguished guests get here and the Bhaji's are waiting to be fried. The Saag Aloo is done too! (Sorry, it rhymed!)


And I made some cardamon, carrot and cashew cupcakes from Cupcake Blog.

The first lot were too small and flat- I blame the patty papers- they are too small for my tins! I also only filled them 2/3 full as suggested in the recipe- but they didn't dome and my oven was definitely hot enough- if anything it tends to be too hot. The extra thermometer was reading 195 degrees celsius at one point and I definitely had it set at 175.



So I bit the bullet and filled them right up and loaded them into bigger cupcake papers....and voila!


I'm not going to frost them- I think there's enough fat in the butter chicken to compensate for the lack of frosting. Also the recipe ended up making 36 cupcakes. That's a lot of cupcakes! Maybe I should have waited till tomorrow to make them- I know they would be eaten at work! I've frozen some, with the idea that I can defrost them when I feel like cupcakes but don't have the time/ energy...

So naked cardamon, carrot and cashew cupcakes for dessert? Maybe not completely Indian- but "inspired"?

Book Review- Australian Women's Weekly Cupcakes

Excellent! Personally I love this book. It has some great cupcake recipes and also some amazing decorating ideas. I took the idea for the hearts cupcakes in Post one from there, although I did change it somewhat. The recipes are straightforward and easy to follow and there are fantastic tutorials in the back for different decorating ideas. Great stuff!

What have I baked from here:
vanilla cupcakes
marble cupcakes
double choc raspberry cupcakes

What I plan on baking:
aces- but with a different bottom. They are the inspiration for the cupcakes for my mother inlaw's birthday. Possibly a carrot base or orange poppy seed.

The toppings and cakes are interchangeable and they are all interesting sounding.

The cupcaketress warms up!

Cake decorating has always been a dream for me. I love cake. Well who doesn't? More importantly I love decorating, embellishing and make things look to good to eat.

Why have I taken up cake blogging? Well....

It all began a couple of months back. With the cupcake bake-off at work. One of my colleagues was leaving to go overseas and I decided to bake some cupcakes. I did them the night before, banana cupcakes with yellow sprinkles, vanilla raspberry cupcakes with pink frosting and marshmallows and chocolate cupcakes with sprinkles. One of my other colleagues made perfectly iced vanilla cupcakes. PERFECTLY ICED.

So I enrolled in a cake decorating course. My first cupcakes are documented here:






They were vanilla cupcakes with vanilla buttercream frosting and a layer of fondant. Not so bad for attempt 1.

But there is something lacking in vanilla cupcakes. I like flavour. In fact I love flavour.

So next came the double-choc raspberry cupcakes:






The ones with the brown tops are iced with chocolate fondant as well as the decorations.

This week however, I was inspired by autumn leaves and have created these beauties.





These were a vanilla and chocolate marble base covered with fondant.