Fireworks Cupcakes

Back when I graduated from college, I moved back in with my family. Being the oldest of 4 kids, I knew that coming back home would mean that I needed to help around the house as much as I could. So, since I got off of work the earliest, there were evenings where I’d try to cook for my family. Most of the first meals were disasters…I’m sure my family just ate them to make me feel better, but I learned very quickly the fundamentals of cooking. I’ll never forget the one night when I tried to make a simple chicken dish with gravy, and my Mom came home to find me essentially boiling chicken. I tried…I think we had pizza that night.

It took me quite a few months to get the hang of things, but after watching numerous cooking shows and sneaking in some reading time of my Mom’s beloved Better Homes & Gardens magazines, I decided to start a food blog. My first post pictures were nothing extraordinary, but those recipes were pretty darn good! I was proud of myself. 🙂

After I got comfortable cooking, I got the itch to make pretty cakes. I took three Wilton classes, and my coworkers (who got a fresh, decorated cake every week) quickly became my best friends. I learned a lot in those classes, and accumulated a TON of icing tips in the process. Nowadays, I don’t put my Wilton classes to practice much, and I really only use about 10 of the same tips over and over again (for cookie and cupcake decorating).

However, when I went to Food Blog Forum, I saw these adorable Monsters, Inc. cupcakes (scroll down in Julie’s post), which were decorated using what is commonly called the grass tip. I thought that was so adorable and creative! I definitely wanted to try something like that at home. A couple of weeks later, I found these fireworks cupcakes while I was in a Pinterest wormhole (You know…when you check out the popular pins, then find a random pinner and look through all of their boards? No? Just me?). Sadly, it was just a picture with no tutorial, but I had a feeling I could replicate these cupcakes.

All you need for these cupcakes are a double batch of frosting, piping bags, couplers, a large cupcake tip (I used 1M) & a grass tip (Wilton 233).

First, simply frost your cupcakes, using 1/2 of the frosting and a large cupcake tip. Basically pipe a flat swirl (no height is needed…you’ll get height in the later steps), leaving the edges of the cupcake without frosting.

Then, divide the remaining frosting into thirds, dying one third blue, leaving one third white and the other third, red.

Put your first color in a piping bag, fitted with a coupler and the grass tip. Pipe the frosting going from the outside in, towards the center (making sure none of the original white icing shows through). You can leave the center of the cupcakes without this frosting, though, since there will be plenty of frosting added to the cupcakes in later steps. Here’s a picture to show what I mean…just keep in mind, I’m a geography major…never took an art class. 😛

Here’s how they come out.

Next, add the second color to a fresh piping bag, fitted with a (clean) coupler and grass tip. Start piping from the outside going in, but this time, leave a little bit of the red icing showing around the edges.

For the final step, add the last color in a fresh piping bag, fitted with a (clean) coupler and grass tip, and pipe from the outside in, leaving the first two colors showing.

Then, for an optional last step, you can add sprinkles to the very center of the cupcakes. 🙂

This may seem time-consuming, but once you find your groove, the piping goes by pretty darn quickly. I’m already thinking up some fun, new ways to use the grass tip again on cupcakes. I really should fork out the Wilton tips more often. 🙂