louienet's son Benjamin turned 2, so he had an Elmo birthday party this past weekend. I was commissioned to make the birthday cake, so we decided on Elmo cupcakes, limiting food coloring use by using red sugar over white frosting & making separate features that could be scraped off if necessary ( Read more... )

First, a sort-of garden-related bit...the flowerpot cupcakes v2, with edible pots! The pots are essentially shortbread dough, with just enough Ghirardelli chocolate powder & red food coloring for a terracotta pot look. I packed the dough into non-stick muffin tins for the shells, baked them slightly by themselves, then added the devils food cake ( Read more... )

This is just a variation on a theme most have seen at least somewhere before = fudge frosted devils-food cupcakes with crushed chocolate cookies sprinkled on top as soil...but for kids you put in gummy worms. ;) I thought of this for a spring BBQ this weekend, then tomorrow is a co-worker's birthday who doesn't want a big deal made of her day, so ( Read more... )