Mrs. Potts Cookies!

My friend Katherine recently returned from a trip to London, where she found these adorable teapot cookie cutters to bring back for me!  So I of course decided to make Mrs. Potts cookies!!

I don't know about you, but when I make sugar cookies, it's always a huge mess:

Yikes!  But they all came out clean:

I used a sugar cookie recipe handwritten by my mom which I found in a cookbook in our dining room. So I don't know where it's from originally!  I looked up a hard icing recipe from allrecipes.com which worked out veeeery nicely!!  The almond extract really made it tasty, and the consistency was perfect for spreading on my cookies!  Especially when I didn't have any fancy cookie-decorating tools, and decided to use my offset spatula (that I use for my cupcakes). 

Then I added some color:

Purple and yellow, and some pearl sprinkles to make her fancy!

I didn't know what to do about the faces… I'm so used to using candy bits and sprinkles for cupcake decorating!  I had just purchased a nail art kit from CVS that came with a nail art brush, which is real small and thin, and since I hadn't opened it yet, it was clean enough to use on these!  I dipped it in a drop of food coloring for the eyes and mouth!

Hey little guy!

Here they are on a doily: 

I made some variations, like closed eyes and gold sprinkles on the handle:

I put one of my best Mrs. Potts on 2 of my fancy schmancy tea saucers for a fancy photo!

It was a lot of work, making everything from scratch, but I was so happy with the results, and they tasted delicious!!!

Psych Pineapple Cupcakes!

My favorite TV show, Psych, had its series finale last night on USA.  Jim & I watched (well, I re-watched) the entire series in the last 3-4 months and happened to catch the last episode we needed to be caught up literally JUST IN TIME for the finale.  In fact, I think we missed a couple seconds of the beginning of the finale!!  It was that close.

As any true Psych-o would be, I was super into celebrating the last episode.  I painted my nails like pineapples (the show's running gag for those of you who aren't "psych-o"), made pineapple earrings (available in my etsy shop, Have A Nice Clay and pictured below), wore my lime-green sweater (the "Psych" logo color),  taught myself Gus's "Jamaican Inspector-Man" song on ukulele (from Psych: The Musical), and made pineapple (hummingbird) cupcakes.

Now let's get down to cupcake business!

The first part of the batter made a pretty pattern as I spatula'd it down.  This is just the basic flour, sugar, baking soda mix.  At some point there was also cinnamon, eggs, vanilla… But let's not get particular.

Hummingbird cupcake batter (at least in the Martha Stewart recipe) calls for crushed pineapple (the reason I chose it for Psych), shredded coconut, chopped walnuts and mashed banana (check out all those fun adjectives!  crushed, shredded, chopped and mashed! watch out, onlookers!).  Now, I have a few loved ones who do not like coconut (but I love them anyway)--my boyfriend Jim, and my dad.  Since I was making these as a surprise for Jim (and a treat for me), I realized maybe he wouldn't love a surprise involving coconut.  So as you can see in the above photo, I split the base batter in 2.  In one half I mixed all the fruity nut things, and in the other I left out the coconut. 

Crushed pineapple: 79 cents at Stop & Shop!

Coconut, pineapple, walnut, banana goodness.  Now, I'd made cupcakes for my friend Kelly's baby shower years ago, and I still had these cupcake liners left over:

They are very specific, so I can't use them for work functions or parties unless I want people to think I'm stealthily notifying them of a personal situation.  I used them for these cupcakes mostly because they are the only liners I have that have any green to them (the side, which I realize I didn't get a photo of, has a green stripe in the middle, along with white and pink).  Then I realized they DO have something to do with Psych--a couple episodes before the finale, Lassiter has a baby girl!  Hooray!  Here they are, ready to go!

If you're making hummingbird cupcakes, watch out--the batter is really tasty!  

As an aside right here, I just wanted to show off my footwear for baking.  I sprained my ankle last week & have to wear this "boot" for 2 weeks.  Wearing a heel on my other foot made it much easier to get around.  And here is my adorable apron that Jim got me :)

Anyway the kitchen smelled amazing.  I labeled which plate had coconut cupcakes on it and which had no coconut.  Then I went to bed.  The next day I put cream cheese frosting on all of them:

Then I broke out the icing gun Jim got me for my birthday!

Or should I call it a "decorating tool?"  Anyway the box is super colorful and has examples of all the kinds of decorations you can do with the assorted tips it comes with (there's even one for FILLING a cupcake with icing! Mmmm):

It was wonderful to use!  Simple to fill (I just spatula'd in all the icing and screwed the tip back on), precise handling, you control the speed, and it's easy to clean for a quick color-change too!  I used green to make the pineapple stems first, with the thinnest tip so it came out in thin lines.

Then I made dots of yellow with a thicker star tip for the spiky exterior of our friend the pineapple.

I'm super happy with how they came out!!  This icing tool is awesome!!  And my design actually looks like a pineapple!  :)

I experimented with different stems:

I only really needed a couple cupcakes.  The recipe called for 40.  FORTY!  I halved the ingredients to make 20 (it actually yielded 18) and then packed 4 in one of these adorable cupcake boxes I got from AC Moore:

Perfect for our Psych viewing party for 2!  Coconut on the left, no coconut on the right, and pineapple in ALL!  I thought the finale was PERFECT.  Plus, during the after party show, they featured a clip of ME playing ukulele to their theme song (it was a collection of clips of fans singing the theme song, and they used mine for the end of the song)!  It was an exhilarating moment!!  You can see my rendition here!  

Rainbow Cupcakes!!

I read in a Betty Crocker's Best Recipes magazine about these "Tie-Dye Cupcakes" with this beautiful rainbow icing.  I read the instructions for the icing, but it sounded a little confusing, so I looked up a video that was VERY helpful and it is this one here. 

No, this isn't ice cream.  It's ice-ING!  Two can's worth.  Mmmm.  I think I'll just stop here and eat it.  End of post.

...Just kidding! So you separate two can's worth into three bowls and then dye them red, yellow and blue.

Mike said it looked like the food the lost boys eat in Hook.

So you get out your pastry bag and your #6 star tip (I had to go out and buy them) and turn the bag inside-out to start piling on the icing.

First you spoon on one color.  Then another on top.  Then another.  Not too bad!  Then you start squeezing it out on a plate or wherever until you see the first color mixing with the second.  Then put it on your cupcake!  I made funfetti cupcakes the night before.  That's an easy rainbow cupcake to make!  The Betty Crocker recipe called for tie-dyed cupcakes (different colored batter all piled onto each other) but I was much more interested in the frosting!

That was my first.  How PRETTY!  I absolutely loved doing these.

Just keep going till you run out.  I ran out after exactly 12 cupcakes.  I had more icing but the bag was getting heavy and I didn't know how much I should have started out with.  This is what the bag looked like when I'd squeezed it all out:

Oooh!  Starting to get a little brown.  But otherwise it looks like I'm working on a tie-dye shirt!

I used Disney Princess liners OF COURSE!  They were going-away cupcakes for my friend Monica who just left for college.  We have this common bond over Disney Princesses.  Of course my favorite, Ariel, wasn't even represented ON the wrappers...

 Hooray!  Well, there might not be an Ariel, but here's an aerial view! (ha ha)

 
This was my first time using a pastry bag and I LOVED it!  It was so easy and they look so cool.  I would definitely make these again!

muppet. cupcakes.

I have been waiting to make these forever. I've been a Muppet fan for just as long. David & I used to watch Muppet Babies as kids on Saturday mornings. Our parents took us to see Muppet Babies Live at The Meadowlands. I remember watching Muppet Frog Prince on TV & some episodes of the Muppet Show. We also especially loved Muppet Family Christmas, the holiday movie when all the Muppets (ever--Fraggles & Sesame Street included) come to Fozzie's mom's (Emily Bear's) house (Thank you, Caitlin, for the link!). David & I have a special place in our hearts for Muppet Treasure Island, an often-overlooked Muppet Treasure (eh??? fun-nee!). I remember going crazy over Weezer's video with the Muppets (pretty much my 2 favorite things at the time) for Keep Fishin', and for the great connection my college roommate, Caitlin, and I had (have) over our mutual love for Muppets. We watched the Mahna Mahna and Mr. Bassman videos probably once daily our first month living together. I also had an intro song to my radio show that she and my other college friends helped me record for "Elyse's Muppet Radio Show."

...So it only makes sense that I'd want to make Muppet cupcakes!! I don't know what took me so long! But it probably had something to do with the Muppet Movie coming out, and then Bakerella doing Muppet Cake Pops. Anyway, it's time to get things started!!

First things first, here I am mixing the cake batter:


My parents got me these awesome mixing sticks for Christmas. They look like drumsticks on one end and one has a music note cut out of the spoon:


So there's a cookin' end and a rockin' end:

Haha. I love it!

Then I switched to the hand-held mixer. Once the cupcakes were done, I mixed up a dixie cup of vanilla frosting & green food coloring. I piped black icing onto white melting chocolates, and cut out collars from green sugar paper (my first time using it!).

Hi-ho, Kermit! Except he has a swirl on his face, and no mouth. So I cut out some red sugar paper:


He kind of looks like anime-Kermit here. I made mini versions of all of them, too. For mini-Kermit I used coconut M&Ms (for the white ones--I could have just bought white regular m&ms at Fuzziwigs, but I'd already been there twice in preparation for my magnum opus, so I got these from CVS which is closer to my house) and edible-ink markers for the pupils!


(I had left my camera at Mike's from taking pictures of the dinner we cooked the night before--spinach & turkey bacon macaroni & cheese, thanks for asking--and the sugar paper collar had wilted overnight! Now I know that about sugar paper!)

Then I tried Fozzie. I got so excited when I was at Target the other day browsing through the 50%-off Christmas selection & I saw Reese's Bells on sale! I didn't even remember that these were out, and the fact that they were half-off was like a post-Christmas present from Target to me. Thank you, Target. They made perfect Fozzie hats!!


His ears are orange melting chocolates with black icing piped on, and his nose, eyelids and mouth are sugar paper.


It makes me so happy when they come out just how I wanted!! Hey friends!

Oh, hey, little Fozzie! I had these Wilton candy eyes (they used to make smaller ones but I could find them NOWHERE) that looked like they'd been on the shelf for a while and the pupils were sort of green and dusty-looking. Fortunately my edible-ink marker did the trick! I also used one of those sugar dots from the receipt-tape-looking sheet of different colored dots... You know what I'm talking about? That old-fashioned penny candy stuff. That was a perfect nose. I used the bag of 2 sheets absolutely once. Actually twice, I made 2 mini Fozzies. I have so much candy left over. Anyone want to come over?

The hat, another perfect Reese's creation, is an Unwrapped Mini Reese's. I had to buy a whole zip-top bag. I know, I didn't want to buy SO MANY but... I actually really did... And I actually really love them. I mean, those mini Reeses with the wrapper just slowed me down! I have to thank Bakerella for the hat idea though, she used them on her Fozzie cake pops and they just look perfect and adorable! I'm so glad they worked here, too!

The next day (yes, it took me a few days... decorating is exhausting!) I made Rowlf. I realize his face should be a little lighter and his ears darker, but what are ya gonna do? I used what I had. I love how the chocolate chips in the frosting makes him look furry! I bought Jordan Almonds way back because I thought they'd make perfect Rowlf eyes (a little Rowlf history: his eyes are spoons, or at least they're exactly spoon-shaped, and he was the mascot for some dog food ads in the 60's, and was even a co-star on the Jimmy Dean show, a variety show from the same time). His nose is a dark chocolate malt ball, and his ears are flattened Tootsie Rolls.

Mini-Rowlf has jelly bean eyes (David's idea!!), a coconut M&M nose, and cut-out Tootsie Roll ears (I got fancy and used a tiny cookie cutter).

I also found out flattened Tootsie Rolls melt when enclosed overnight. Turns out they have a lot in common with sugar paper. And his eye is a little lazy, but we'll forgive him.

Then it was diva time. Miss Piggy actually required a LOT of work. And I'm sure she wouldn't have it any other way. I made a light pink/orange color for her piggie complexion, then halved a marshmallow for her nose (it was a last-minute inspiration when I remembered that I had a bag of marshmallows in my room. I asked my dad to buy them for me a while back when I wanted to get in the Christmas spirit, and big marshmallows in my hot chocolate is a fond Christmassy memory).



Then I took some white coconut M&Ms and drew black pupils with blue irises on them with edible-ink marker, then half-dipped them in purple melting chocolates for her eyelids.


Complicated stuff! This might be rocket science!


I tried to draw on little eyelashes with black marker but melting chocolate isn't a big fan of markers. Then, and this gets me the most excited (about Piggy, anyway), I put peach (I think) gummies on her head for ears. They look the most Muppet-like out of everything! The texture, I mean. I had to prop them up with marshmallows. Good thing I had them!


Piggy has so many hairstyles, I didn't know which one to use. Of course I just went with the easiest. I mean, classiest:


O and of course I added pearls! Sprinkles, actually, "pearlized" sprinkles.


Aw! I used an ear as little Piggy's nose, and the eyes are the Wilton candy eyes (given the same treatment). I used some pink fondant I wanted to try as her ears, and it smelled weird and plastic-y, but it was easy to mold and looked pretty cool.




Kermieeeeee!

Gonzo looks so funny in steps. I first put blue icing on, then rolled the edges in blue sanding sugar. I used white melting chocolates for his eyes, and (also a last-minute inspiration) banana Runts as eyelids!


Sugar paper mouth.. and the nose...

A blue Jolly Rancher! Mike gave me that idea. I thought maybe I could find a blue Tootsie Roll, but alas the wrapper is blue and the Tootsie is white. He still didn't look just right without those head feathers! So, another last-minute idea, I used 2 blue jellybeans!


O yay! He just looks so Gonzo-y!

I'm not as crazy about mini-Gonzo. He looks, well, we'll just say "dazed," and his jelly bean nose just isn't doing it for me. I stuck a fish candy in his head as the feathers, which makes me laugh.


Finally, on the third day, though I wanted to make the Mahna Mahna "Snowths" (the pink guys), chickens, Sweetums, and well I guess every Muppet ever, I settled on ONE non-always-in-the-spotlight Muppet. Lew Zealand. He wears a collar, like an old-fashioned white clown collar, and throws fish.

There's my pieces for him. Then I realized he kind of just looks like Ernie with a moustache. I used coconut M&Ms and a red gumball. Of course I put an extra cupcake holder around him to look like the collar (I was pretty excited about that part).


And, also of course, I put little candy fish around him, since he's just not Lew Zealand without his fish.

I put them on a mini cupcake just for fun:


Mike got me a new camera for Christmas, by the way, so all my pictures are nice and crisp & clear! This fish one (above) especially came out nice.

Then, as per Mike's suggestion so I wasn't driving myself crazy trying to make more Muppets or letting some bald cupcakes go to waste, I iced the leftovers and wrote "The Muppets" on them.



And here they all are! Together!

I brought them to work (so we wouldn't devour them here at home) and my coworkers just LOVED them. It made me feel so great. They all came to the break room to admire them, loudly and excitedly, and I ate it all up. (Actually, I didn't eat any. I made myself a mini Fozzie when I got home and ate that! It was pretty delicious with the Reese's cup and the M&Ms! I took the eyes off though!).

Also, I can't believe I frog-ot (haha) to mention how much I love Jim Henson. He is absolutely one of my favorite people--he seemed like such a loving, creative, youthful individual who made the world so fun and beautiful. Thank you, Jim Henson. :)