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| Tennis, basketball, soccer, softball and baseball |
Spring has always been one of my most favorite times of the year. It means beautiful flowers and new beginnings. . .and major sports!!!! I was a little bit of a ball player when I was younger, softball being my favorite, but I loved track too and then there was basketball. Spring meant baseball/softball was beginning--the smell of dirt, leather and sweat all remind me of Spring as much as a daffodil! I know I am so weird, but that's OK! I totally admit it. Anyway, in my house. . . Spring is a wonderful time of year. . . It is March Madness (NCAA basketball), Opening Day (MLB baseball), NBA finals (really, I am just glad it is over, but now that we have a team in Oklahoma, I like the NBA a little better), The Masters (golf), and now that I have children, soccer is in full swing (actually they play in both the fall and spring, but it all starts again now). Because I love sports so much, I thought I would make some sports themed cupcakes. And since the "near-perfect game" last night, I thought I need to pull this one out and write about it.
I have this really cool domed cupcake pan. I simply started out with a cake mix. If my goal is a designed cupcake, I generally start out with a cake mix, just to simplify my life a little. Anyway, what I did on this day was to start with a yellow cake mix. I filled my pans about 2/3-3/4 full as you can see above. There will be a little "rounding of the cupcakes" and you can just slice that off after the cupcakes have cooled. If you fill them with less batter all it will do is just make a smaller ball; it won't go to the top and flatten out. If you don't have a pan like this, you can always use a regular cupcake pan, or you can use oven safe mugs. Another option would be to make this in a 13x9 pan and use a biscuit cutter and cut out circles. They might not have the dome shape, but they would be a little more "round in shape" than just a cupcake.
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| As you can see here, mine were slightly rounded. I just ran a knife along the top and flattened it out. |
When I use a shaped cupcake pan like this one (I also have some adorable silicone pans that have shapes, I think they are Wilton brand), I use Candy Melts instead of icing. You can also use Almond Bark, but I think Almond Bark is a little thicker and sets up harder and it isn't as easy to bite through. Candy Melts come in a variety of flavors and colors and set up in a nice thin coating over the cake. When using candy melts, just follow the packaging; those directions really are spot on. If you have never used them, just keep checking them in the microwave and stirring every 30 seconds or so until they are completely melted.
You have a couple of options when using a melted candy. You can just dip the cake into the candy like I have done here. If you have a really crumbly cake, that won't work as well because the crumbs will just get into your candy. If you do that, you will have to coat it twice and use two different bowls of melted candy. One will be your "crumb coat" and the other will be your coating that will show.
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| Dipping my cupcakes |
After I dipped my cupcake, I pulled it out (you can see in my picture above that there is just a little space that I can hold on to. I also used my mini-spatula to help it along. I put my cupcake on a rack to let set. You can also freeze or refrigerate them to make it go faster, but it isn't necessary if you have the patience. I just don't have the freezer space, so I just left them on my countertop.
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| Letting them set up |
After I dipped all of my cupcakes in a variety of colors--white for baseball and soccer, orange for basketball, yellow for softball and tennis--I put the finishing touches on them. I had to do this step twice because I didn't have my skinny tips for the icing. I just used the Wilton icing tubes. It is so hard to get the pure colors--the red and the black. I bought white too, since I wasn't making any other icing. After I replaced the tips that I let the garbage disposal eat, I pulled the icing off and tried to "re-work" the magic.
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| My cupcakes with the larger tips |
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| The "re-worked" cupcakes. |
