So I spent the past few months planning his birthday party -- first from whether it would be a group dinner out at a restaurant or a party on his roof deck (I let him make that decision), and once the decision was made, there was lots more planning: from the color scheme to the treats I'd bake to the food I'd order to the drinks we'd serve to the favors I'd give out to the should-there-be-a-photo-booth-at-the-party debate to the guest list to the centerpieces, and so on and so on and so on. Have I mentioned my OCD tendencies?!
I wanted to make cupcakes. But I couldn't make just one kind of cupcake. Heck no! There needed to be a variety of cupcakes...and other treats, too. I am, after all, JulieBakes, and he has made it a habit of making me show people all of my baked goods when I meet them, so I couldn't embarass myself with just one kind of cupcake (even if it was his favorite cupcake). So I made lots of cupcakes. Lots and lots of them! Iced with a perfectly piped heap of icing and beautifully decorated. I mean, it is a PARTY, right?
So for the party, I made red velvet cupcakes with cream cheese frosting (I used dark cocoa powder since I loved the flavor it gave the red velvet bundt cake I made a few months ago). And dark chocolate cupcakes and vanilla/yellow cupcakes, and then I made vanilla buttercream and chocolate buttercream (this time I used 1/3 dark cocoa powder and 2/3 regular cocoa powder), and then I made a mixture of cupcake combinations - chocolate cupcakes with vanilla buttercream, yellow cupcakes with chocolate buttercream, chocolate cupcakes with chocolate buttercream, and yellow cupcakes with vanilla buttercream. On each cupcake, I piped the icing on in a swirling pile with a big round tip (Ateco 809). And then I went to town decorating them. I had seen these cupcakes on Pinterest and they were my inspiration for B's birthday cupcakes. I totally copied them, but it was so worth it....the cupcakes were gorgeous!!
I had a bunch of "pearls" -- white, black, graphite grey/silver, and silver. I used silver dragees as well. And then I used white and black nonpareils, and teeny tiny silver dragees that were basically the size of nonpareils. I started by strategically placing the pearls over half of the piped icing, and then after that was done to my liking, I started sprinkling a mixture of the silver, black, and white nonpareils (I mixed 2 Tbsp of each color together in a bowl and then used that mixture for the sprinkling) over the same half of the cupcake where I had placed the pearls.
I'm not going to lie, it's a bit time consuming, especially when it involved decorating 36+ cupcakes....but c'mon, look at the them....it was TOTALLY worth it. Even I - who never brags - think they're pretty freaking adorable!
I had a bunch of "pearls" -- white, black, graphite grey/silver, and silver. I used silver dragees as well. And then I used white and black nonpareils, and teeny tiny silver dragees that were basically the size of nonpareils. I started by strategically placing the pearls over half of the piped icing, and then after that was done to my liking, I started sprinkling a mixture of the silver, black, and white nonpareils (I mixed 2 Tbsp of each color together in a bowl and then used that mixture for the sprinkling) over the same half of the cupcake where I had placed the pearls.
I'm not going to lie, it's a bit time consuming, especially when it involved decorating 36+ cupcakes....but c'mon, look at the them....it was TOTALLY worth it. Even I - who never brags - think they're pretty freaking adorable!
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