So these past few days my kitchen has been transformed into a scene similar to what you might find on the streets of Japan, Kawaii characters littered about; except instead of Bandai figures, these were from the the ever growing line of Shopkins figures. Modeling for us are the following characters: Mandy candy, Cheeky chocolate, Bubbles, Millie shake, Frank furter, Pretz-elle, Pineapple crush, Apple blossom, Corny cob, Wishes, Cupcake chic, Kooky cookie, Googy, Jiggly jelly, Fairy crust, D’lish donut, Chee zee (not shown below), and Spilt milk (not shown below).
Each character was individually cut, carved, shaped and brought to life from combined pieces of fondant. If you are interested in learning how they were made I’d be happy to post a separate tutorial…upon request though as they are a tad time consuming. 😉
These adorable characters were used as toppers for yummy chocolate and red velvet cupcakes. I know many of you have your own go-to recipe for these cupcake flavors so I won’t bother to post those here.
For the frosting, some of you maybe wondering how to do the swirl effect (those of you who are pros, you can space out for a few minutes 😉). This can easily be accomplished by putting one color of frosting in one bag, then another color of frosting on another bag and make sure not to overfill each bag. Prepare a larger size bag and fit with your piping tip. Place both of the frosting-filled bags inside the larger bag and make sure that the tips from both bags are fitted through the piping tip. Squeeze both bags evenly. You may have to do some practice piping until you can get both colors to come out of the piping tip evenly. Of course you can also go the easy route of buying a piping bag and tip set that are specifically designed for this purpose but…what’s the fun in that? But I guess if time is of the essence (because you’ve literally spent days playing with your fondant Shopkins), then no judgement here…Hehehe :).
I also wanted the cupcake liners to match the Shopkins theme and since I’ve had some problems in the past where the liners turn really dark and lackluster after baking, I’ve decided to make my own liners.
The beauty of making your own liners is that you can customize the color and the design of the liner based on the theme that you are working with. There are also templates available online that you can print out and all you would need to do is to cut them and fit them over your cupcakes.
Here are few samples of the final cupcakes:
Anyway off to bed I go since I’m not one of these Shopkins characters that can keep their eyes wide open at all times, and stay cheerful 😋
Special post birthday greeting to the little girl who requested these cupcakes…. Hope you liked them sweetie!
Til next adventure….
– CW
Willyummsbakery 