Pumpkin Spice Cupcakes!

We had a potluck at my new job to celebrate the end of training, and since I was in a pumpkiney mood, I decided to make pumpkin spice cupcakes for it! These were seriously the easiest cupcakes I've ever made.

I got started on Wednesday evening by making mini marzipan pumpkins as toppers. I've never worked with marzipan before, but this definitely won't be my last time. It was so easy to work with and smelled so good!

I baked the cupcakes Thursday evening. I love how they crackled on the tops, so pretty. They made the whole house smell heavenly, too. 

I filled the cupcakes with a squirt each of pumpkin butter on Thursday evening as well. I have a filling tip from Wilton that makes filling soooo easy. 

 

I frosted them all early Friday morning before work with cinnamon cream cheese frosting. I found the liners at Michael's, and they're by Martha Stewart. She has some awesome Halloween stuff. The "poison" liners have a skull image on the bottom of the cup, and the "beware" ones have spiders.

At the potluck. I displayed them on my Wilton cupcake stand with a big black charger plate underneath to hold the rest, since there were 24. 

These cupcakes were a huge hit and made me tons of new friends, haha. They were positively scrumptious as well! It was torture having to wait to eat them, since I was sitting near them and could smell them all day. I've already been asked by David's aunt to bring some to Thanksgiving dinner, though!

Easy Pumpkin Spice Cupcakes

• 2 (18.25 oz) packages spice cake mix
• 1 (30 oz) can pumpkin pie filling
• 2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 tsp butter flavoring 

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Combine all ingredients in a large bowl for 2 minutes. Contents will be very thick. Line muffin tin with paper cups. Fill 2/3 full with batter. Bake 22 to 24 minutes (or, if you're only doing one 12-cup tin at a time, about 10 minutes). Makes about two dozen, usually a little more. TIP: If you have extra batter but not enough to fill all the cups of the muffin tin, fill the remaining empty cups halfway with water. It helps the cupcakes to bake more evenly.

Cinnamon Cream Cheese Frosting

• 1 (8 oz) package cream cheese, softened
• 1/4 cup butter, softened
• 2 cups powdered sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon

Beat the cream cheese and butter with an electric mixer in a bowl until smooth. Beat in the powdered sugar a little at a time until incorporated. Add the vanilla extract and cinnamon; beat until fluffy.

Robot Cupcakes

Hey guys! Sorry it took me so long to post! I've been super busy starting a new job!

Anyways, Benjamin's robot cupcakes turned out fantastically. They were apparently a huge hit at his awesome robot party! I had a ton of fun making them, and I'm glad they turned out as well as they did.

Here they are, in the plastic cases I got at the All In One Bake Shop and with my new tags attached! They smelled sooooo good!

And here they are displayed at the party! Aren't the signs Kristi made just adorable? She's so creative.

And here is one super happy birthday boy!

The cupcakes themselves were just french vanilla and devil's food, both made from a mix (terrible, I know, but they're soooo much easier!). The frosting was a shortening-based buttercream that I've lost the recipe to. It had to be shortening-based so that they wouldn't need to be refrigerated. The cookies are just plain sugar cookies with royal icing!

More news! These cupcakes will actually be the last order I'll be doing for a while. I want to focus more on developing my skills and testing new flavors and ideas before I make more to order. I think it'll be a nice little break to just make a dozen or so whenever the mood strikes me rather than having to make so many and plan so much. It'll be a nice little experimental period for me. =]