MINECRAFT Cupcakes

A couple of days ago, a friend on mine posted on Facebook about how she was wanting to know if anyone could make some "minecraft" cupcakes for her son's birthday party this weekend. I love an attainable cupcake challenge. I thought, "If I have a picture, I just might be able to do that." I started looking on one of my favorite sites for ideas: Pinterest, and I found them. Click Minecraft Cupcakes to see where I got my motivation. This person did an amazing job and gave great step by step details. Check this one out too.

Minecraft Cupcake

This is a photo of what mine looked like.

I just used a basic chocolate cake mix (made according to the package directions), a basic buttercream icing recipe, a little green dye, some Wilton "color mist" in green, some "fruit leather" strips and a really neat cake pan that I borrowed from my mom. That is all I did in a nutshell.

First things first. I made the cake mix. Pretty simple so far right. The next step is where it might be a little trickier if you don't have this really cool pan. If you don't have this pan, you might want to follow the steps to the blog I posted earlier. They did it without this pan. I wanted to use this one though. I try put my own little touches on things.

After I made 48 of these with two mixes, I made a basic buttercream icing. Wilton has a really good one. It is pretty much my guideline. I don't always deal in exact measurements. I find recipes are really just great guidelines to follow. I like to improvise a little. Anyway, what I did for my icing that was enough for all 48 cupcakes was the following:

2 sticks margarine
1 stick butter flavored Crisco
8 cups powdered sugar (also known as confectioner's sugar)
3 teaspoons (REALLY GOOD) vanilla
2 Tablespoons milk
Green decorator dye

Cream the margarine and Crisco together. Slowly add the powdered sugar. Add the milk (you might need a little more than what was called for, depending on how thick you like or need your icing) and add vanilla. Add dye until it reaches the desired color.

After I frosted each cupcake, I cut out a square out of parchment paper. I made different square shaped cuts in this paper. It was going to be my template. I would lay this over my cupcake and use the Wilton Color Mist. I would sometimes rotate it and give it a little more dimension.

Wilton Color Mist

My final step (or so I thought in the beginning anyway) for these cupcakes, was to cut out shapes for the face. I used a pizza cutter for the eyes. It made quick work of those little squares. For the mouth, I used kitchen scissors. Once I got into a rhythm, it didn't take as long as I feared it might.

I got these at Wal-Mart, but Target also has a very tasty alternative that would work equally as well.

I boxed them up, and took them to the party. Once I got to the party, the birthday boy began to tell me how cool they were. Then he said, "But did you know that creepers explode?" I said that yes I did know that creepers explode, but not to worry, these will not explode. Then his little brother mentioned how neat it would be if they actually did. It got me to thinking about something I had seen (again, on Pinterest): putting pop rocks in with your sprinkles. Thankfully we got to the party a little early, so off I sent my husband in search of green pop rocks. I told him red would be fine if he could find green. The boys said the red would make us think they were about to explode.

Cupcakes with Pop Rocks

It had a nice little explosion, but I think the green ones would have been better. I do think you need to add them at a later time. Maybe not exactly last minute, but I don't think it would work to mix them in your icing. The moisture content of the icing might make the pop rocks lose their "potency."

This is one of those cupcakes that I think looked cooler than they tasted, but that is my opinion since I am not the biggest chocolate cake fan. I am a really tough critic on myself when it comes to taste. I think you could also make brownies instead of a cake mix and it would be just as cool.

If anyone ever did want to post this to Pinterest, that is fine with me. I haven't figured out where to but the button on to do that yet. I think I read somewhere that I have to give permission. I hope I have given proper credit to the correct people. If not, I am sure that someone will correct me. I hope you have fun making these. I might have rambled a little in this blog, but I am still trying to get the hang of it. :)