Decorating Cupcakes with Buttercream

It's time to experiment and make the famous Buttercream to decorate and give flavor and color to the Cupcakes. Buttercream is the most used to decorate cakes and cupcakes. It has the property that when mixed with different ingredients, it is much delicios.

Buttercream (also known as butter cream, butter icing, and mock cream) is a type of icing or filling used inside cakes, as a coating, and as decoration. In its simplest form, it is made by creaming butter with powdered sugar, although other fats can be used, such as margarine or lard. Colorings and flavorings are often added, such as chocolate, fruit purees, and various extracts. Buttercream is a common topping for cupcakes, sponge cakes, butter cakes, and other desserts.

Here I tell you some utensils and ingredients to start decorating our delicious cupcakes with buttercream:

Utensils

Mixer

The mixer will allow us to mix the ingredients and whisk the cream with their rods high speed.

Piping bag

They are essential for decorating cupcakes with buttercream, we can find them as cloth , plastic and some are disposable.

Nozzles

Nozzles and piping bags are used together. You can find nozzles stainless steel and plastic nozzles also. There are plenty of nozzles that allow us to make different designs with the buttercream and you can find different brands.

Sieve or Strainer

It is advisable to sift the icing sugar to detach it and get it a thinner texture, achieving a softer cream.

Silicone Spatula

It is used to mix the cream and clean the walls of the bowl that we use to mix the cream, so the entire cream will be used in our cupcakes.

Measuring cups and Kitchen scale

Measuring utensils allow us to add the exact amount of ingredients in our baking recipes.

Spatula

This spatula is used to extend the frosting or cream on the cake.

Ingredients

Butter

You can go searching and testing different brands of butter on the market, until you find one you like. Always use unsalted butter.

Icing Sugar

The icing sugar is the ingredient that will give the sweet touch, if the cream is thinner, the texture will be better.

Essence, cookies, fruits, etc.

You can include in your recipes for buttercream variety of ingredients such as vanilla, jams, cookies, fruits and many more, to achieve different flavors with each buttercream that you prepare.

Gel Dyes

The dyes play a important role in the presentation of the cream, making them more attractive to the palate of people.

Edible Powder

The edible powder is intended for decorative purposes and it is suitable for consumption, plus we can find them in different colors for our decorations.

Sprinkles to decorate

In the market there are varieties of sprinkles, colored rain, edible pearls, tiny forms, etc. The sprinkles make the cupcakes more attractive, fun and delicious.

It is time to put into practice your creativity, take your piping bag and unleashes your imagination!

Decorating Cupcakes with Fondant

Decorate cupcakes for parties is the trend these days. A cupcake decorated with the famous pastry fondant is a success because in addition to give the sweet touch, people enjoy it very much when seeing them and eating them.

Fondant is an edible icing used to decorate or sculpt cakes and pastries. It does not have the texture of most icings; rolled fondant is akin to stiff clay, while poured fondant is a thick liquid. Ingredients to prepare fondant are Unflavored gelatin or gelatin flavored, Cold Water, Glucose, Glycerin, Butter, Sugar glas, essence or flavoring to taste.

Here I tell you some utensils and ingredients to start decorating our delicious cupcakes with fondant:

Utensils

Roll to extend the Fondant

It is used to stretch the fondant. The side guides help us get different thicknesses depending on the ring color we use.

Silpat

Having a nonstick mat with measures can facilitate stretching and cutting the fondant.

Fondant cutters and Silicone molds

There are variety of fondant cutters, some are flat, others have ejectors that allow us to manipulate the least possible the fondant, others bring textures that are transferred to the fondant to make it more beautiful. Also there are the silicone molds with different cavities that allow to get different figures.

Fondant embosser tools

Those tools are used to give different finishes and textures to the fondant.

 

Fondant sculpting tools

This set of tools is used for 3D modeling, allowing a better finish in the figures we do with the fondant.

Fondant Smoother

This tool allow stretch the fondant to avoid wrinkles. They are used for large surfaces such as cakes, in the case of cupcakes although it can help us, it is not indispensable.

Ingredients

Fondant

You can make your own fondant, but you can also find it in the market ready to use. The fondant comes in various colors, but you can buy it in white color and dye it in the color you need. There are many brands, you can go trying and choose the one you like more.

Gel Dyes

When we choose to work with white fondant, we have to buy dyes to dye and make our small works of art.

Vegetable shortening

It is used to hydrate the fondant, making it more flexible and also it help us prevent sticking to the work surface.

Edible Powder

The edible powder is intended for decorative purposes and it is suitable for consumption, plus we can find them in different colors for our decorations.

Edible Marker 

We also can find in the market edible markers that are helpful to complement fondant decorations.

Remember that this kind of work, takes time, presicion and creativity. If we have the basic utensils and ingredients will be easier to achieve!

Baking Cupcakes

To bake the best cupcakes, just we have to find the recipe that we want to prepare. Today we can find many tasty recipes by internet. Baking cupcakes is an exact science, we must follow recipes carefully, if we alter some measure the cupcake can change the taste or texture, unless we are creating a new recipe, it is best to respect the original recipe.

This is a basic recipe for beginners, it is easy to prepare and tasty.

Baking ingredients Cupcakes

It is advisable to use the ingredients at room temperature, this allows the ingredients are incorporated more easily into the mix. To prepare the mass cupcakes we need 200 g. sugar, 120 g. mild olive oil, 3 large eggs, 200 g. wheat flour, 1 tsp baking powder, 120 g. milk and 1 tsp essence of vanilla.



Procedure to prepare Cupcakes

1.- We should preheat the oven to 180 ° C. 

2.- Place the olive oil and sugar in the bowl.

3.- Beat at medium speed.

4.- Add the eggs and beat.

5.- Beat at medium speed.

6.- Sift flour through a sieve.

7.- Add the baking powder.

8.- Add the teaspoon of vanilla extract or chocolate powder.

9.- Add milk and mix.

10.- Continue stirring in order to obtain a homogeneous mass.

11.- Divide the mass into the molds.

12.- Bake for 20 minutes or until the mass to rise completely and let cool before decorating the cupcakes.

Remember that to achieve a spongy and tasty cupcake, we should follow recipes!

Basic Utensils to prepare Cupcakes

To get started in the world of those delicious cupcakes, the first thing we should do, is to look among the cookware of our beloved mom or go out to cake shops to buy those basic utensils we need to prepare the cupcakes.

Mixer

The mixer will allow us to mix the ingredients and whisk the mass with their rods high speed.

Baking Moulds

We can find silicone molds individually and metallic trays with 6 and 12 cavities. It is a matter of trying different options and selecting with that we see fit.

Cupcakes Cases

Those paper molds are used to put the mass, we can find them in various brands and designs with different colors and prints, nowadays are sold in any supermarket,  some are better than others.

Sieve or Strainer

It is advisable to sift the flour to detach it and get it a thinner texture, allowing more fluffiness in the cupcakes.

Rack

It is used to cool the cupcakes after baking them.

Silicone Spatula

It is used to mix the dough and clean the walls of the bowl that we use to mix the mass, so the entire mass will be used in our cupcakes.

Measuring cups and Kitchen scale

Measuring utensils allow us to add the exact amount of ingredients in our baking recipes.

Corer to fill the cupcakes

This tool is used to make a hole in the cupcakes and put different fillings.

Ice cream Spoon

This tool allows us to distribute the mass of the cupcakes, so they will be the same size.

Remember that your hands and enthusiasm are also necesary to prepare some delicious cupcakes!