Super Bowl XLVII Cupcakes

Hello again! Such a rare moment, blogging two days in a row! I hope in the future to have more posts to share, though. Well, today is the Super Bowl, and up until about 2 days ago, I had no clue who was in it. I pretty much watch for the commercials. I saw a preview for a commercial where a baby,  panda and a bunch of other animals are going into space!! I want to see that one! I love pandas! And space! *ahem* Anyhoo...

This is perhaps the 4th or 5th year that I've made Super Bowl cupcakes, and it's the only way I remember which teams played! For the San Francisco 49ers cupcakes, I went with a caramel buttercream, so they would already have that tan color for the background. The cupcakes were almond flavored (love that combo!) 

The Baltimore Ravens cupcakes were vanilla cake with vanilla icing. I decided to keep the background white, so that people don't get a mouthful of black icing. Blech!

I went with the simple "B" because the raven's head would just be far too much detail for me (I was making these at 1 am this morning!) I think they turned out pretty nicely, and I hope they're a hit tonight at the Super Bowl party.

No matter what team you're rooting for, have a fun and safe Super Bowl! I'll be on the lookout for the space panda!

Big Baby Mickey Cake and Super Bowl Cupcakes!

My weekend was full of cake. Between work and home, there was a lot going on. I had my first 12" cake-- it could barely fit in my tiny oven! Then I had my usual Super Bowl cupcakes (this is the 4th year, I believe). I finally got to attend the Super Bowl party my cupcakes were going to--as well as even eat one!

For the Baby Mickey cake, I started with yellow cake iced it in vanilla buttercream. I had also baked off one cupcake as the baby's "smash cake" (client's preference). This 12" cake made me learn that 3 boxes of cake mix and its ingredients was the absolute most that I could fit in my Kitchenaid at one time!

Anyhoo, after base icing the cake, I scored the Baby Mickey design with my trusty fondant tool.

Then I started filling in the lines and smoothing it with a warm spatula.

What I like to do to save icing is start with one color then mix in more colors as I go along. So I started with light blue then mixed more blue into it later. I started with yellow also, then mixed it into the orange, then mixed that into the brown until eventually everything ended up being mixed into black.

And voila! Here's the finished product with its matching little cupcake. From one of the party-goers, I heard the cake was a huge hit, and I may be getting a call for someone else's birthday party. Fabulous!

So yesterday, I made two dozen super bowl cupcakes, a dozen for each team. Honestly, I am not a football person at all, so I barely knew who the teams were. I was glad, however, to find out that they pretty much had the same colors. For the Giants cupcakes, I went with base icing in white (the smaller the amount of blue icing, the less likely there will be blue teeth at the party). Then I added "ny" in blue and outlined in red. Pretty simple.

But when it came to the Patriots, it got a little tricky... Instead of drawing the whole patriot's head, I just went for the hat, which I thought was more of a focal point of the logo anyway.

They seemed to work out, even though they kind of look like a map of Kentucky or something... Hmm Ah, well. The cupcakes were still a hit at the party, and people ate the Patriots cupcakes despite the fact that they lost... I think. Hey, I was only there for the food and the commercials (I loved OK Go in the Chevy Sonic ad, by the way).

Super Bowl Cupcakes: Packers and Steelers

So this is the third consecutive year in which I have made Super Bowl cuppin' cakes. I m glad that the logos are somewhat easy this year. As a non-football-follower-person, I probably wouldn't have known who was playing tonight if I didn't have to know in order to make these cupcakes. At any rate, I hope these little confections looks sort of close to what these teams are wearing.

I started with a French Vanilla cake mix made with an almond emulsion. I let the little cakes cool, then I made a single batch of Butter-Vanilla Buttercream. After icing the tops of the cakes white, I put them into the cupcake holder that they were going to end up in. It's much easier this way than going through all that work then accidentally smushing it on its way to the box.

I mixed up some dark green for the Packers logo and drew the "G." I went back over and made a little green oval around.

Then I mixed some goldenrod and made an outline around each green oval...

For the Steelers, I used the same goldenrod and drew the top diamond, then followed suit with the red and blue.

After all colors were used, I mixed all of them together and mixed black into it. I tried my very best to write "Steelers" with a tiny 1 tip, but you can sort of make out what it means to say. Hopefully, these cupcakes will be a hit at the Super Bowl party tonight!

As for which team I'm rooting for... I have no idea! May the best team win!