Happy Halloween!

Hey there, Cupcakers!! Looking for a sweet way to get your bake on?! Today is the day - Happy Halloween! Check out all of these week's Cupcakin' It Up blogs for good ideas and see how I executed some of them in yesterday's blog.

This morning, I found myself short on time, and I had to throw cupcakes together. With some sprinkles and left over candy, I was able to decorate these red velvet cupcakes in 10 minutes!

Red velvet is great for Halloween, not only because red velvet is a hot flavor these days but it's also a deep shade of (bloody?!) red! Perfect for this holiday, and, conveniently, Christmas too!

Whether you've been planning your cupcakes for weeks or just decided (maybe while reading this blog!) that you want to whip up a festive batch, making cute Halloween cupcakes is easy and always a crowd pleaser!

Pick Your Poison

BOO!! Three hours later, I bring you Cupcakin' It Up's own creations! It was easy-

INGREDIENTS:
yellow cake
green and yellow food dye
sugar cupcake toppers / bag of candy corn

And a little mix of poison and adorableness makes...











What you can't see here is the green dye that was blended into the batter to create that acidic feel of poison!! Muhahahaha!!

Happy Halloween!! More to come....

A Halloween Cupcake Patch

When my talented cousin sent me her festive, Harry Potter-themed creation (fresh from Canada!), it got me thinking about the endless possibilities of pumpkin patches and cupcakes...

It takes so little to make cupcakes so cute at Halloween! Lucky for us, Wilton has made it easy with their adorable sugar candy toppers (right).

If you can't find them at your local market or don't have time to pop into a Michael's or Party City, here are a few more ideas that can be easily accomplished with some orange pumpkin candies (found at any grocery store!) or even some green dye and coconut. Get inspired below!


The cutest little pumpkin tree that Halloween has seen!


Coconut+green dye


100% icing!

My plan is to combine the Wilton candies with the pumpkin candies in a little happy pumpkin patch. In terms of cake flavor, I'm thinking either carrot cake or pumpkin spice cake to round out the theme and color. I'll try to post these on Saturday, so stay tuned!

Spooky Cupcakes

Happy Halloween Week! Yes, yes, I know I've been MIA since the summer, but work and studying have left me too exhausted to type or bake.... However, I intend to make it up to you in honor of my favorite cupcake holiday! Halloween is such a versatile holiday for cupcakes - you can go gory and spooky or cute and cuddly, AND no matter what you decide (or have laying around in your kitchen!), you will always sweeten somebody's day by baking them!

Today's Halloween cupcakespiration focuses on spooky cupcakes. I myself have three different events that I have to bake for this year and plan to make one batch of spookily disturbing cupcakes, using the Wilton sugar skull and cross bones (right, found at Michael's or Party City) and some festive skull muffin cups (left, also purchased at Michael's). My plan (that I will post to the blog on Friday for those of you who would like to get inspired for Halloween!) is to make yellow cake with green dye dripped down the center and acid-green-colored icing for the top. Will this detour tasters from eating them?! I hope not - but if it does, more for me!! MUHAHA!

Here are some more spooky designs I found from other sites that might give you more good ideas!


Eek! Spiders!! Some black licorice, chocolate sprinkles
and red M&Ms or red hots make these spooky treats easy!


For those skilled with an icing tip and black dye,
these really make a spooky statement!


Ok, so this is arguably adorable - but with some tick-tacks,
marshmellow, and white icing, this can be done.


Christmas come early?! So cute and so easy AND all done with icing!
Or get your Oreo on for the eyes!!

Thing to be wary of... making an eyeball cupcake - I find that seeing it in person is just weird looking. It looks like you tried to make a spider but failed (or maybe that's just my cupcakes! haha). Anyway, these are super cute options to spookify your baked goods!

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween, friends!! This morning, I woke up with the urge to bake. The urge to create. The urge to spread some cupcakespiration! As you can see, I created a hodge-podge of some of the inspired designs that I have features in early October - the Owls, made of Oreo eyes and chocolate chip pupils; mummies with white bandages and yellow faces, orange pumpkins, green frankensteins, and some creepy crawlers!

*Hint: at your local target, you can find "sluggy gummies" to use instead of just drawing them like I did.

This is the first year that I don't have any particular plans, and have set up my cupcake tree in the hopes of getting some trick 'r treaters in my building. Or someone to come over and eat my cupcakes!

Have a spooktacular, cupcakefull night!

Pumpkin Spice and everything nice!

I found this recipe for Spiced Vanilla Icing in Fine Cooking Magazine and was immediately intrigued. They paired it with buttermilk cake - but I put it with a spice cake to give it a fall holiday flair. Here's the original recipe:

9 oz. (2 1/2 cups) confectioner's sugar
3 tbs. buttermilk, more as needed
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1/4 tsp of table salt

Now, let me preface my critique by saying that I sold out of my dozen spiced cupcakes and received rave reviews about their flavor. That being said, I was skeptical about adding salt to icing - upon a highly scientific spoon test, I was not impressed. In fact, I almost scrapped the entire batch of cupcakes all together. However, no one commented on the salt, and if anything, it seemed to contrast the spice cake in an interesting way.

If I could make a couple of simple amendments to the recipe, I would say that instead of a 1/4 tsp. of salt, I would do a small pinch of salt. Additionally, I would say do the 3 tbs of buttermilk and use just regular milk to add more moisture if you need it. Otherwise, the buttermilk makes it too thick.

Whether it's a unique Halloween treat or a house warming Thanksgiving present, this spiced recipe really mixes up the typical autumn dessert into something people of all ages can enjoy!

Happy October!!

October is here! - which, granted, feels exactly like August in LA BUT it means that it is officially appropriate to start making Halloween themed treats! Muhaha!!

I kicked off the October celebration of Halloween treats at a Michael's cookie demonstration in Burbank. I confess myself disappointed. It all took place on one table with one confectioner who spent most of the time running around the store gathering supplies. The cookies didn't even look very appetizing. Maybe I'm just a cupcake girl at heart, but aren't cookies meant for dunking - not painting! The only thing that piqued my interest was a flyer for a cupcake decorating class that cost $15... but what the flyer neglected to mention (and I only learned from word-of-mouth) is that you have to bring your own cupcakes AND icing. wtf?! But one must turn flour into cookies in this scenerio - so I saw opportunity. Inspiration to take that $15, buy some sweet muffin cups and dye and decorate my own darn cupcakes at home! For free!

Bring on the cute cupcake designs and Halloween decorations!

Real Estate for the Dessert-Lover!

Talk about a room with a BOO! t-hehe! Who says that gingerbread houses are only for Christmas?! With all the cute sugar candies they have these days, the options for sweet Halloween fun are endless. Last year, I thoroughly enjoyed a pack of candied spiders and ghosts on my cupcakes - why not use them on a house? Ghosts deserve, a home too! I felt really inspired by the options I found online recently. Can you image how cute a candy-corn picket fence would be?! Adorable.

Check out some of the sweetest real estate around!


I'm loving the candy corn roof top.
Courtesy of Baking Bites


I think Kit Kat shingles could be equally as delicious...
Courtesy of Savvy Halloween


How about Kit Kat paneling and oreo shingles! YUM!!
Courtesy of About.com


Although I don't see how realistically, one could make the cookie this perfect, I did like that the roof is off-kilter a little bit. You could do that with graham crackers easily!
Courtesy of Solvang Bakery

A Halloween candy house will make an excellent centerpiece at any party table and plus, you must eat the construction scraps after all! It's the green thing to do... ;-)

Bubble, bubble, project and trouble!

When I woke up on Monday morning, I could feel a project brewing - with the summer season coming to a rapid close and fall just around the corner. So, naturally, I decided to skip my weekend chores and go to Michael's to ponder the possibilities. The moment I walked in the door, I saw a plastic pumpkin patch littered with tastefully placed fall leaves and smelled the crisp scent of pumpkin spice candles on sale for $4... sigh... sale... oh the sweet smell of sale!

Now, just to give you a frame of reference, I'm the kind of girl who puts up her Christmas decorations the day after Halloween and celebrates every holiday with a uniquely decorated muffin cup. So, I was not at all put off by the prospect of a Halloween project - though seeing the wall of holiday wreathes and the isle of sparkly winter bangles did make me do a double take! Wasn't it just last week that I was sweltering in my apartment and sitting by a pool, ready to celebrate the summer?!

I turned to the baking isle for guidance. There, I was greeted by assorted cookie cutters for Thanksgiving and Halloween - the creepy (skulls!) and the cute! - plus cooking pans that held endless options of accompanying Halloween muffin cups. I had a brief lapse of self-restraint as I threw a sparkly black icing tube into the cart, rationalizing that it could be used for more than just adorable spiderweb cupcakes. I still don't know how I feel about a haunted gingerbread house... I think it might be a fun use of candy...

But the question remains: what could I rationalize making that would be fun and potentially useful? Perhaps a Halloween wreath or trying my hand at pumpkin spice bread... the possibilities are endless. This week, I will explore some edible options! Let me know if you have any inspired ideas to welcome the Fall!