Baking 102...

September is a popular month for birthdays....3 in less than a week.

It was pretty hard to top the rainbow cupcake success from yesterday, but I think I managed okay. I used the same recipe as before, but didn't use food colouring in the batter. Today's creation was all about the coloured icing. Once again, you can't make red with your basic food colouring. I'm lead to believe that you need something special from a store called Michael's. I don't have time to shop there because I'm too busy making desserts!


I started with a basic white cupcake (eggless, of course). I didn't use cupcake liners and used about 2/3 the amount of batter per cupcake. I also had to reduce the baking time from 18 minutes to 14 minutes. After cooling, I cut the tops off all of them.



I then used a light yellow frosting on the bottom half. Just enough to make it sticky to hold onto the next part.






The next step was crucial. I used a chocolate version of the recipe to make a giant flat cake, about 1/2" high. I used a cookie cutter to cut out 24 little circles.







One chocolate patty on top of the yellow icing, which is now obviously representing mustard.

I think you can see where I'm going with this now...









With two more coloured sections, I create Ketchup and a thin ring of lettuce. I only piped the green because I didn't want the cupcake to be overloaded with the butter frosting. Believe it or not, there is such a thing as too much icing!




With a fourth colour (I like to call it bun-taupe), I frosted the top, placed it ontop of my lettuce and ketchup and sprinkled it with a few star candies to simulate sesame seeds. And Voila! My burger-cupcakes are complete. I hope they taste as good as they look!

Mini Burger Cupcakes

BUNS:

• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 cup white sugar
• 8 tablespoons custard powder
  
• 2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 tablespoon vinegar
• 2/3 cuup melted butter or margarine
  
• 2 cup water

1. Sift all dry ingredients together and make three wells in the bowl.
2. Add the wet ingredients and mix well.
3. Fill cupcake pans 2/3 full, bake at 350° for approx. 14min.
4. Allow cupcakes to cool, then slice in half.

BURGERS:

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 cup white sugar
• 4 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
  
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 tablespoon vinegar
• 6 tablespoons melted butter or margarine
  
• 1 cup water

1. Same directions as above, steps 1 & 2
2. Line a jelly roll sheet with parchment paper
3. Pour all the batter onto the parchment paper and spread evenly.
4. Bake at 350° for about 10 minutes.
5. Using a small, round cookie cutter, cut out as many patties as you can.

BUTTER FROSTING:

• 1/3 cup butter
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 3 cups sifted confectioners sugar
• 3 to 4 tablespoons milk
• Food colouring