Spooky Cupcakes

It seems a shame for these guys not to make an appearance, what with the spooky, misty evenings and everyone ‘going early’ on Halloween decorations this year.

These are a project that most kids…or big kids can get on board with. If you are short on time or baking skills you can decorate ready-made cakes and use ready to roll icing. Having a Halloween party? If that’s still a thing, keep guests amused by giving them some icing and a cake and getting them to decorate their own. To be honest this isn’t really a recipe post, it’s just a bit of inspiration to get you started.

At the bottom of the page, as well as a video of me decorating in super-speedy double time,  I’ve added my standby fairy cake recipe, you can add anything to the mix, but there’s a chocolate version too which is good for the first option…Spooky Spiders.

Spiders

For these you just need:

• Black & white ready-to-roll fondant icing
• Liquorice Catherine Wheels

1. Roll out some black icing and cut out a circle with a cookie cutter slightly bigger than your cake
2. Smooth the circle over the frosted (or Nutella’d) cake
3. Unravel the liquorice and cut into 3cm pieces
4. Make leg holes in the sides of the icing and push the liquorice legs in
5. Make eyes with small balls of black and white icing and fix on with a little water
6. Use the end of a brush or a skewer to make a mouth and add white fangs if you fancy

Next up are the slightly more fiddly pumpkin patch cakes.

Pumpkin Patch

• Green and Orange ready-to-roll fondant icing
• Brown icing or some flakes of chocolate

1. Roll out some green icing and cut out a circle with a cookie cutter slightly bigger than your cake
2. Smooth the circle over the frosted cake
3. Roll a ball of orange icing and mark it with a skewer to make pumpkin segments
4. Press a hole in the top and add an icing or chocolate stalk
5. Twist rolls of green to make tendrils and stick these and the pumpkin to the cake with a little water

Next we are onto Mr Jack Skellington skull cakes.

Jack Skellington

• Black and white ready-to-roll fondant icing
• Black food colouring or a tube of black decorating icing

1. Roll out some white icing and cut out a circle with a cookie cutter slightly bigger than your cake
2. Smooth the circle over the frosted cake
3. Make eyes with squashed balls of black icing
4. Poke nose holes with the end of a brush
5. Press on a wide mouth with the end of a brush or skewer and add a few ‘stitches’
6. Brush or squeeze some black icing or food colouring into the nostrils, mouth and stitches

Want to go a teeny bit gory? How about some bloodshot eyeballs?

Eyeballs

• Black, green and white ready-to-roll fondant icing
• Red and green food colouring 

1. Roll out some white icing and cut out a circle with a cookie cutter slightly bigger than your cake
2. Smooth the circle over the frosted cake
3. Cut a circle of green for the iris, and a smaller black circle for the pupil
4. Stick these one with a drop of water and add a small white dot of icing for a highlight
5. With a thin brush add a little colour to the iris and some extra bloodshot wiggles around the eyeball

Here are the whole cute, spooky bunch all together.

 

Plain Vanilla Cakes (x9)

• 125g Soft Butter
• 125g Caster Sugar
• 125g SR Flour
• 2 Large Eggs
• 1/2 tsp Vanilla Extract
• 2 Tbsp Milk
• Some ready-made buttercream or Nutella for sticking

Plain Chocolate Cakes (x9)

• 125g Soft Butter
• 125g Caster Sugar
• 100g SR Flour
• 25g Cocoa
• 1/2 tsp Baking Powder
• 2 Large Eggs
• 1/2 tsp Vanilla Extract
• 2 Tbsp Milk
• Ready-made (or home made) buttercream for topping, or you can use Nutella.

1. Beat the butter until soft and light
2. Beat in the caster sugar and vanilla until pale
3. Add the eggs and flour (plus cocoa and baking powder for chocolate version) and mix well
4. Add the milk and mix to a soft spoonable consistency
5. Spoon into 9 muffin cases in a muffin tin
6. Bake for 20 minutes at 175ºC turning the tin around after 15 minutes
7. Cool on a rack
8. Spread each cooled cake with a spoonful of buttercream/frosting

NB If you prefer to make smaller fairy cakes this mix will make 12, just use fairy cake cases and reduce the cooking time to 18 minutes