Meow

I stumbled upon another cupcake design in "Hello, Cupcake" that I though was SO cute and also manageable called "Fat Cats". I must tell you that I am a big cat person. I have two cats, Zeus and Apollo, whom I adore. So I will dedicate this post to them.

(Zeus and Apollo)

The kitty cakes require one cupcake for the head of the cat and another cupcake for the fish bone on their full tummy. The book called for a lot of candies that I couldnt get my paws on so I did improvise some ingredients.

Ingredients

• Fur- dyed vanilla (which ended up being a little too yellow, whoops) and dark chocolate icing. Piped from a baggy with the corner snipped in the shape of an X. This gives the icing the fur effect.
• Ear shape - half of a chocolate cookie wafter. The fur icing was then piped on top. This posed somewhat of a problem because the cookie was heavier than I anticipated. It was difficult to keep the ears on the cupcakes.
• Eyebrows- shaped from tootsie rolls, which made my fingers ache. chocolate icing or licorice (which they called for) would have been much easier.
• Eyes- mini M & Ms
• Nose- heart-shaped Sweet Tarts, which I was unhappy with. The directions called for the heart candies in Runts but can you believe I couldnt find a package of Runts anywhere?! Ridiculous. Anyway, the Runts would have been much better because the candies are brighter and smaller, making the cat faces a little more proportional.
• Cheeks- Mentos mints. I was not happy about this ingredient either because I feel that, texturally, hard chewy mints and soft cupcakes do not go together very well. Plain white icing or maybe the tops of marshmallows would have done a better job.
• Tongue- Laffy Taffy
• Fish bone- white chocolate wafers, melted and traced on a stencil
• Paws on the belly- half of a mini marshmallow with icing as the claws

I was fairly happy with the final product, though the many candies and loads of icing did make the cupcakes harder to eat. If I were to make the cupcakes again I would replace some ingredients and make sure my vanilla icing was white, not yellow. Nevertheless, these were very cute cupcakes that are great for sugar-loving kids.