Easy Cupcakes

Making this Star of David cupcakes for Hanukkah is as simple as tinting icing blue and piping 2 triangles.

What You Need: 1 cupcake (baked and cooled); icing tinted light blue; white icing (works a little better if you add some piping gel, but this is not essential); pastry bag (any type); round tip 1, 2 or 3. You could also just buy a tube of white writing icing or gel.
How to Make It: Frost cupcake blue. Let set for a few minutes. Use tip to “draw” one triangle and then draw another in the opposite position. (Hint: Icing pipes better if you “anchor” each line by lightly touching it to the surface. Then squeeze as you hold tip slightly above the surface and move in the direction you want, touching down again when you reach another turning point.)

Let these penguin cupcakes coming marching onto your Christmas dessert table, or any time of year, perhaps at a Happy Feet or Surf’s Up party?

What You Need: 1 cupcake (baked and cooled); icing tinted light blue; 2 thin mint cookies (we used Necco); 2 Tic Tac mints; bit of orange fruit roll; white icing.
How to Make It: Frost cupcake blue. Using knife, cut 2 thin mints in half. (You’ll have an extra half, and we say just eat it. Or make more penguins.) Arrange one half horizontally for head and the other two, splayed out, for wings. Cut bit of fruit roll into triangle for beak. Add 2 Tic Tacs for feet. For eyes, you can use a decorating bag and tip 1, 2 or 3 to pipe eyes, or just wing it and dap them on with a knife.

Super-quick to make, these snowman face cupcakes are great for Christmas or any winter event. All you need to decorate them is mini M&Ms and a bit of orange fruit roll.

What You Need: 1 cupcake (baked and cooled); white frosting; brown mini M&Ms; bit of orange fruit roll.
How To Make It: Frost cupcake white. Arrange M&Ms into eyes and a smile (or frown, or laugh, or however your snowman is feeling). Cut bit of fruit roll into triangle shape for nose.