Cupcakes Cupcakes Cupcakes

Once just the staple of PTA bake sales, cupcakes have hit the big time these days. In Seattle two cupcake bakeries: Trophy (Wallingford Center) and Cupcake Royale (Ballard, West Seattle and Madrona) are opening additional locations, when many place are feeling lucky to just stay open. Of the two I like the look of Trophy cupcakes better, but Cupcake Royale is a true Seattle place with it's "legalize frostitution" motto (yes you can get this phrase on a shirt or bumper sticker). Even NY had an article published in one of the cooking magazines about a fancy cupcake shop.

So for my daughters birthday I did the standard cupcakes for school and then added a make your own cupcake extravaganza for her party.
School Treat-Bugs


Make your own cupcakes
This is a great idea for anyone past the smearing food in ones hair stage. No decorating (the hardest part of any cake) and the kids have a blast. While I had a lot of sprinkles on hand, you can easily add in a number of candies whole and chopped. I also added a couple types and colors of frosting.


I made chocolate and vanilla cupcakes as well as white,pink, green and chocolate cream cheese frosting. You can find the recipe in almost any book and honestly it is not a sin to use the box. To the standard chocolate recipe I added mini chocolate chips, but those could have easily been used as a topping as well. I have included the frosting recipe below.

Finished Product by a gaggle of 11/12 year old girls



Cream Cheese Frosting
4 Oz (one package) Cream cheese (room temp)
1 stick butter (room temp)
16 oz powdered sugar
3 tbsp milk
1 tsp vanilla (leave out if you want more pure white or buy from a cake store)

Mix butter and cream cheese until light and fluffy. Add sugar a cup at a time, with milk between cups. Add vanilla at the end. If too thin add more sugar, if too thick add more milk (tsp at at time).

Separate and add gel colors. Put in piping bags or Ziploc bags with a small corner cut. Can be made ahead, just bring to room temp and stir well before using.

You can find a number of cupcake stands at speciality stores or on-line. If you plan on serving cupcakes often (even at bake sales) I recommend investing in one. They run between $20-$35