Thursday Tutorial - Pumpkins

This is how you can make the pumpkin toppers just like the ones I made for the Pumpkin Cupcakes..

You can also use a tooth pick/skewer if you don't have these tools. I found my set of wilton tools here.

I small ball of orange fondant, and one even smaller ball of brown. It's best to use paste colours to colour your fondant, as anything else will just be too hard! You can find a whole range of colours from many different brands here.Use a little bit of water to stick the brown into the hole atop the pumpkin. Quick and easy!

I Want To Play A Game...

The Saw movies have got to be my all time favourite horror films. This is the puppet face from the movie...

Friday The 13th

One of my favourite horror movies is Friday the 13th..

This is the hockey mask from the movie.

Ash & Co.

It was my friends 21st this weekend, and I made the cupcakes for her party. The entire time leading up to her birthday she asked for a tiffany box cake. I was a bit hesitant because it just seemed a bit tricky to make, but I think I did ok...

She loved it, which is the important part! Happy Birthday Ash.

50 Vanilla cupcakes, with Vanilla buttercream and fondant gerberas, happy birthday sign and butterflies.
50 Chocolate cupcakes with dark chocolate ganache, covered with blue fondant and white bows.

Tiffany inspired chocolate mud cake, covered with dark chocolate ganache and fondant.

Recipe of the Week - Pumpkin Cupcakes

I found this recipe on the Pioneer Woman's website, and thought it would be perfect for halloween cupcakes. They are pumpkin spice cakes, with cream cheese frosting. You can find her recipe here, as well as other amazing recipes and interesting things.

Preheat your oven to 180 degrees celsius.

Mix together 2 tablespoons sugar and 2 teaspoons mixed spice. Leave to the side (you will need it at the end)

In a bowl, sift the plain flour, sugar, baking powder, salt and mixed spice.

Add 4 TABLESPOONS of butter to the flour mixture, and cut in with 2 knives until it is all incorporated and looks like breadcrumbs.

In a seperate bowl, mix the pumpkin, egg, evaporated milk and vanilla essence.

Add the pumpkin mixture to the flour mixture, and fold gently until all ingredients are combined.

Pour the mixture into a prepared muffin/cupcake tray.Sprinkle the sugar and mixed spice that you mixed up before, on top of the cupcakes. This will give them a nice crunch on top!

Place in oven for 20 - 25 minutes.

Allow cupcakes to cool before turning them out onto wire cooling rack. Let cool completely before icing.Pioneer Woman recommends the cream-cheese frosting. It does go well with it, but you don't need very much icing at all!
They're just as good without icing!

Picnic Treats

I had lunch the other day with some friends down by the river..

All Cupcakes Vanilla, with vanilla buttercream and fondant decorations

I took these along to eat with our delicious smorgasboard of triangle sandwiches, dips, chips & cheese and crackers.

Recipe of the Week - Witch Hats

This is something quick and easy to make. Kids will love them. Fill them with any kind of treat for a nice surprise!

You Will Need...

I used chocolate wheaten biscuits, one side covered in chocolate. You can use any round biscuit you want!
You could also use fruit roll-ups instead of the sour straps. Anything that will be easy to place around the base of the ice cream cone.
200 grams was enough to cover 6 biscuits and ice cream cones, as well as 3 mini ice cream cones and 3 oreos.You can melt your chocolate over a double boiler on the stove, by placing a bowl over a pot of water, making sure the bowl does not touch the water inside the pot.
You can also melt it in 20 second intervals in the microwave, stirring after each 20 seconds.

Place your biscuit - non pre chocolated side down - into the melted chocolate. Place them onto a baking paper lined tray (for easy clean up) while you make the tops of the hats.
Put your ice cream cone into the chocolate, and coat completely. Let any excess chocolate drip off.

If you want to add any nice surprises to the inside of your cone, now is the time. You can put anything inside them.. ice-cream, lollies, chocolates, spiders...
Place the cone onto the chocolate covered biscuit, and wrap you pre cut sour straps around the base. Using the mini m&m, hide the join where the 2 ends meet.

Leave to set either in the fridge. They will set on the bench, the fridge will just quicken the process.
Remember if there is ice-cream inside the cones, they will need to be placed in the freezer!!
If there is a cream based filling, they will need to be properly refrigerated!Don't limit these to witches hats. You could easily make wizard hats, or even christmas trees for christmas..

If you want to make mini ones, I used oreos (seperated) and mini ice cream cones. Following the same instructions above. To colour your chocolate, make sure you use a powder colour, as any liquid colours will make the chocolate seize.