Irukandji Jellyfish Thank You Cupcake Gift Boxes

This was quite an unusual but great fun order.

I had a phone call from a man that had unfortunately been stung by a deadly Irukandji marine stinger whilst on holiday up here on the Islands.  Luckily he was quickly flown to our local base hospital here in Mackay where he was rushed to ICU & received the care he needed to make a full recovery.

He was very happy with the treatment he received whilst at the hospital & thought the staff did a really excellent job of caring for him therefore he wanted to send them a special thank you gift & chose to send two of my cupcake gift boxes with a thank you message/card attached to each.

He thought it would be a fun & idea to include some jellyfish toppers on some of the cupcakes which I really loved the idea of, such fun.  So there were 12 jellyfish & 12 "many thanks" toppers.

He didn't mind what flavours they were so I chose these 3 flavours,

'Diablo Red Devil' (red velvet butter cake) with vanilla Italian meringue buttercream (tinted blue to represent the sea) & blue sugar sprinkles.

'Midnight Delight' (dark chocolate mud cake) with cookies & cream Italian meringue buttercream & broken Oreo pieces. 

'Blondie' (vanilla butter cake) with caramel Italian meringue buttercream & butterscotch crunch bits.

All of the topper were completely edible & made using marshmallow fondant.

I decided to make the little Irukandji jellyfish giving a cheeky little wink as I thought it was quite a fun tongue in cheek order.

On behalf of the gentleman that placed this order along with everyone else that many require their services I would just like to say a big thanks again to all the staff of the Mackay Base Hospital ICU department who do a truly selfless & wonderful job. THANK YOU!

School Themed Teacher Appreciation Day Cupcakes

Well it was "Teacher Appreciation Day" here on the 30th October & I would like to start by saying that in my humble opinion all teachers do an incredible job & are often undervalued & definitely underpaid, so a great big thank you to all teachers everywhere, you do a great job!

This order was prepared in two gift boxes of 5 cupcakes each, one for the class teacher & one for the school principal.

They were the classic & very yummy combination of 'Killer Chocolate' (chocolate flavour butter sponge cake) with vanilla Swiss meringue buttercream. This is one of the simplest but best combos I think whether it is chocolate cake with vanilla frosting or vanilla cake with chocolate frosting, you just can't go wrong.

I modeled the custom toppers in a school theme using marshmallow fondant, black edible marker was used on the ruler & crayons & I piped white royal icing for the sum on the chalk board.  If you can't quite see from the photo the pink banner was embossed with the words thank you.

These were great fun to create & I really hope they were enjoyed by the teachers they were sent to.

Daffodil Day Cupcakes - Cancer Awareness

I made these yummy cupcakes just to have at home for friends, family & visitors to enjoy with the aim of promoting awareness for the Cancer Councils daffodil day. Cancer seem to touch all our lives in some way so it is important we all support such a wonderful cause in any way we can. You can learn more about daffodil day here on the Cancer Councils website.

I took my inspiration from the colours if the daffodil day logo & so I used bright yellow cupcake cases, bright blue buttercream, yellow sprinkles & of course a nice big daffodil.

The cupcakes cake was lemon zing with a vanilla Swiss meringue buttercream & the daffodils I created using marshmallow fondant.

Don't forget to support daffodil day!

The Secret Garden Cupcakes

I was recently invited to a friends house for a tupperware party & wanted to take along something special for her & her guests, so knowing that there would be mainly ladies there I choose to create something very pretty & feminine.  They would also be wonderful for a wedding, for mothers day or a thank you.

These gorgeous floral cupcakes were inspired by the fact that spring is not too far away now. I decided on a secret garden theme featuring all manner of flowers in various colours including roses, carnations, frangipanis, lilies & daisies as well as some leaves, vines, bright butterflies & little tiny ladybugs.

The cake for these cupcakes was my 'Luscious Lemon Zing' which as the name suggests has quite a zingy lemon flavour, I paired this with a subtle lemon & vanilla Swiss meringue buttercream frosting. Followed by light sprinkle of green sugar crystals.

The beautifully delicate flowers, leaves, vines & animals that topped each cupcake I created using sugarpaste & were finished with accents & highlights using edible petal & lustre dusts, cachous & sugar pearls.

Some of the flowers were very time consuming to make especially the carnations but definitely worth it I'm sure you would agree.

These cupcakes would make the ultimate gift to cheer someone special up as they would receive both cupcakes & flowers (completely edible ones too), it doesn't get better then that!

Vanilla Floral Cupcakes

Oh how pretty these cupcakes were, beautiful girly colours & the flowers so dainty, they were the perfect Mothers Day treat, definitely some of my favourite to date I think but would also be great for a wedding or engagement.

It was decided to go with classic vanilla for both the cake & the frosting for these cupcakes which was a great choice I think.

The cakes were 'Blondie' (vanilla bean butter cake) & I recommended (as I often do because it is one of my favourites) Swiss meringue buttercream for the frosting which is very, very silky & soft compared to standard buttercream.

For the toppers I made 4 different sizes & shapes of flower blossoms using sugarpaste in two different shades of pink.

I then made the blossoms two tone with the use of edible petal dust & lustre dust & added some sugar balls to the centre of each.

Finally I finished each of them off with a light sprinkle of pink coloured sugar crystals.