Just thought I'd say hello Aloha with some small cakes.
Hi there. Hello. Hello. How is it going?
This is Mango Pineapple Cupcakes. All tropical like. With graham cracker crumbs for sand and fondant flowers for leis. They would be super-cute for a Luau party. They are really quite easy to do once you have all the pieces and parts.
First start with some cupcakes. Cupcakes. But if you want to try those I did, here is the recipe.
Pineapple Cupcakes
flour 2 1/2 cups all-purpose
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon of baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
1 1/2 cups sugar
3 eggs, room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup milk, room temperature
20 oz. can crushed pineapple, drained and mashed *
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line cupcake pan with 24 paper coatings.
- Whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a medium bowl and set aside.
- cream the butter and sugar in a mixer for several minutes. Add eggs one at a time, scraping down sides of bowl with each addition. Add vanilla and mix until blended.
- Add flour mixture to sugar mixture in three additions with milk in two additions (flour, milk, flour, milk, flour) Mix until combined with each addition
- Add the pineapple and mix until smooth.
- Fill the molds about 2/3 and bake for about 15 minutes.
* I mashed pineapple in a food processor. I'm not a big fan of fruit pieces. Flavor yes. Chunks. Not really.
Mango Glaze
Mangoes 1-2
1 cup butter, room temperature
1 box powdered sugar pounds
1 tablespoon vanilla coffee
- Cut the mangoes. Instructions here.
- Place mango pieces in a food processor and enough that you have about 1/3 cup puree.
- Beat butter and vanilla until creamy.
- Add the icing sugar in several additions. beat until combined well with each addition.
- Add 1/2 cup mango puree and beat until thoroughly combined.
- Spread icing on cooled small cakes.
So it's cupcakes. But what about the fun stuff. Who's ready to play?
Ok, first fondant.
You'll need some to make these cute little leis.
You will need:
Fondant
icing colors
Toothpicks
powdered sugar
wooden skewers
string or twine
Oh ... and Flower piston.
Break a small amount of flux. Dip your toothpick into the icing color of your choice and wipe it on your fondant. Start to knead to incorporate the color ... but not all the way. Sprinkle some powdered sugar on your work surface and rolling pin.
Then roll the fondant evenly and fairly thin. By not knead the color completely in the fondant you will streaking to the marbled research.
Then use the plunger of the flower. Cut the shapes along the color variations to make flowers that seem to vary in shade.
Repeat with several other colors if you wish.
white works, too.
flower plunger cutter shape and also creates an indentation in the center of the flower when you press down.
Then you can use wooden skewers to pierce through the center easily. Drag flowers on the skewers and let dry. Make these the day before so the fondant has time to dry a little. I let them rest on a baking sheet overnight. Make sure they are not pressed closely together on the skewer or they will dry attached to each other and be difficult to remove without breaking the little flowers.
When they are dry, slip about 50 flowers (depending on thickness) on a string about 12 inches long and a knot.
There.
But what about the cute signs Aloha?
When the cupcakes are frosted and cool, dip them in a bowl finely ground / crushed graham cracker crumbs.
Sorry, forgot to photograph it. But you get the idea.
Then make your signs. I'm joking.
I made it easy for you with these ...
You will also need
sticks of wood biscuits
X-acto Knife
Scissors
Cut the biscuit sticks in size. Mine were about 12 inches long so I cut them into pieces about 4 inches.
Print labels on thick paper and cut them individually. Then use an x-acto knife to cut two slits along the diagonal of each side of the label.
Push the sticks through the paper and insert the sticks down in the center of the cake.
as much.
the first time I planned these in my head, I thought they would be super cute draped leis on the signs. But in practice, they worked on better laying around and the sign on the sand.
Hope you like em!
Aloha and ... Bye for now.