June 30, 2006

Panda Cupcakes

I'm back! *whips out apron; scurries around the kitchen, pushes and stacks UNI exam notes aside* Yay!! I'm so glad it's finally over! I hope I did okay for all of my papers, but I'm pretty sure I'll make it thru to next semester with ease. SO that's good news *all smiles*
Baking is my favourite thing to do when I'm happy or when there's a reason to celebrate. We will be having a couple of friends over tomorrow for an "after-exam-celebration"! I'll probably be busy cooking up a storm in the afternoon, so look out for another party-spread post up in a couple of days.
The inspiration for these cupcakes came from a very creative and adorable monkey. I'm not kidding...it was a monkey! LINK. He's extremely witty and charming; would love to meet him for a big hug one day! *sigh*...I'm a child....A small kid trapped in an adults body*blush*. Most people tell me the way I look often contradicts with the occasional childish personality I portray. I guess I think its fun to be a goof once in awhile...I don't deny that most of my cake creations and imaginative ideas often are extremely immature! I should make an "adult" cake/cupcake one of these days! Haha......or on another train of thought; maybe I should just embrace the child in me....don't most people enjoy looking at adorable and funny things which remind them about how it was being a child? I know I do, that's for sure.
I'm going to share with everyone a deep dark secret of mine....SPuddy....*laughs hysterically* It's a stuffed toy which I have been attached too for almost a decade now! I bring it everywhere! I probably couldn't fall asleep without it. I'm actually quite embarrassed of how much I love this stuffed animal of mine...but I tend to only go crazy and talk to it behind closed doors...*whoopz...said too much* haha...It joined me in the kitchen as I baked and took photographs today.I didn't have much time to waste in the kitchen tonight. I swiftly made a simple batch of almond chocolate cupcakes from scratch and popped them in the oven. I made a small bowl of buttercream with 60gms of softened butter beaten with 250gms of sifted icing sugar. This was spread over the cooled cupcakes to form a flat-ish surface. I then piped the eyes of the panda with a piping bag filled with 100gms of melted dark chocolate mixed with 2 tbsp's of cream to form a thick paste.
The eyes and nose of the panda was done with inverted chocolate chips and the ears were merely chocolate coated peanuts stuck to the edges.Pipe the mouth on with a scoop of butter cream coloured with a few drops of red colouring.
YUm!

11 comments:

Cuisine Paradise said...

Halo..Suyin.. How's your EXAM getting on..... Wow your Panda Cupcakes are so CUTE>......

Jen said...

LOL that Spuddy is one mean baker!! Maybe he and Cocoa should have a play date?

pinknest said...

looks delish! i love the inspiration. because i'm obsessed with monkeys!! give me those cupcakes!!

tytty said...

toooo cute!

hope exams went well.

i just brought a friend visiting to cupcakes on pitt yesterday, heh

Anonymous said...

yeah, i still hv that grainy texture. *sobs* u mentioned dat it's the technique problem, x reli d ingredient's. so do u mind to share that technique? wld be vy grateful!

carrots (again, sowwiee)

Anonymous said...

oh, i was talking abt the icing.. eh-heh..sorry, must hv gotten u confused.

carrots

Su-Yin -Décorateur said...

ellena : hey! it went well....not as well as I expected it to be, but i think I'll pull through :). thanks!

jen: LOL yea they should! my spuddy isn;t really big enough to hold any utensils though, haha half the time while taking photos I was busy worrying about getting it dirty! haha

pinknest: thanks :) you should try it too! Hi Monkey is hilarious! LOL

tytty: haha thanks :), how did you like thier cupcakes?

Carrots: If you're making buttercream without icing sugar; make sure u grind the castor sugar to a very fine grain. It should be puffy and blowing all over the place when you scoop it up. Make sure you get all of it as well; scoop the sides off of the grinder; to be safe, work it through a fine sieve. The thing with buttercream is, the more you beat, the smoother and creamier it gets, but make sure you're doing this in a cool temperature though. You dont want your butter to melt. And one other thing I sometimes do is add about 1 tbsp of boiling water into my buttercream at the couple of last minutes and whiz till I get a smooth texture.

Unknown said...

Tat is a cutey. I shld make them for my dgtr.

Anonymous said...

i am so pleased to see that spuddy takes after you in the cooking departement!

Marie Rose said...

I like the delicious looking cupcakes, especially the panda cupcakes, they're so cute!

Carly said...

You probably don't expect a comment on a post you made so long ago, but I just found this page & these panda cupcakes are adorable! And so is SPuddy =]