Cake

During Passover, the proscription of any sort of leavening (including wheat flour) can greatly limit a baker’s possibilities. Yet these cupcakes, inspired by Eastern European tortes, rely on egg whites for leavening and use ground walnuts in place of regular flour, making them a wonderful option for a seder or other gathering. They are also a good choice any time of year for those with gluten intolerance.

What could be more fitting for a late summer wedding in the country than a bunch of cupcakes masquerading as radiant sunflowers? Chocolate-covered sunflower seeds create the centers, while the petals are piped with bright yellow buttercream. Novice pipers, take note: Just as with real flowers, the petals needn’t appear perfect, nor should any two flowers look exactly alike. In fact, you may want to study some real sunflowers to use as inspiration.

Inspiration for new cupcakes can come from anywhere, even a popular childhood sandwich. The creamy peanut butter frosting may be crowned with any jelly or jam flavor; strawberry is pictured, but grape or raspberry would also be delicious. For the best flavor, use natural-style peanut butter in the cupcake batter.

Consider making decorative cupcakes instead of (or to go along with) traditional dyed eggs for Easter this year. The patterns are very simple to produce: Various pastel colors of royal icing are piped onto a cupcake, then quickly swirled or dragged with a toothpick. Modify the color scheme to make cupcakes for other holidays—red and green for Christmas, for example, or black and orange for Halloween.

Be prepared for guests to buzz with delight at the sight of miniature marzipan bees alighting atop piped buttercream dahlias. Honey (of course!) flavors the cakes. Serve them at a garden reception, shower, or child’s birthday party, on their own or with the sunflower cupcakes on page 273.

Applesauce in the batter makes these cupcakes incomparably moist. Pecans add a bit of texture, but they can be omitted. The cream-cheese frosting gets a twist with the addition of brown sugar.

Springerle molds, originally from Germany, are used to form the pure white, spice-laden Christmas cookies of the same name. Yet the wooden molds are also useful for shaping rolled fondant into cupcake toppers in dozens of finely detailed designs, including Easter bunnies. You’ll need to use a springerle mold with a design that is three inches or smaller. Look for the molds from specialty retailers online, or see Sources, page 342. Fondant mimics the color of traditional springerle cookies, but if you can’t find it, use marzipan instead; although it is not white, you can tint it a desired shade with gel-paste food color (see instructions on page 299).

Spicy cupcakes packed with a generous amount of fresh ginger are just right for cool-weather days. Choose fresh ginger that is plump with smooth skin. To peel, run the edge of a teaspoon along the length of a piece, working in and out of the crevices; use a firm but light touch to remove only the papery coating, not the flavorful flesh beneath. A mini chopper or food processor makes quick work of mincing the ginger.

Share the luck of the Irish with cupcakes coated in frosting flavored with Baileys Irish Cream—a liqueur made from a blend of cream, cocoa, and Irish whiskey—and decorated with a sprig or two of real three-leaf clovers. The clovers should be removed before eating (be sure to use only pesticide-free clovers from a reliable source or your garden). You could also decorate the tops with a shamrock stencil, available at craft-supply stores (see Sources, page 342), and green sanding sugar.

If you grew up eating tiny sandwiches made with date-nut bread and cream cheese—or even if you didn’t—you’ll appreciate the wonderful flavor combination of these tiny cupcakes. Crème fraîche is a rich and velvety update, and soft enough for dolloping on top of the spiced cakes. A little batter goes a long way when baked in mini muffin tins, but the cupcakes freeze well and thaw quickly, so you can serve some now and save the rest for later. Or, if you prefer, you can bake the batter in standard muffin tins for about thirty minutes; you’ll end up with about three dozen.

You might want to throw a woodland-themed celebration just to have an excuse to make cupcakes topped with chocolate faux-bois rounds. Faux bois, or imitation woodgrain, is a favorite Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia motif; it can be applied to chocolate using a wood-graining rocker, found at paint-supply stores (see Sources, page 342, for the tool and for acetate sheets). Made with ground almonds and hazelnuts and covered with dark chocolate frosting, the cupcakes are also worth serving on their own, without any other embellishments.

Just like the Latin American cake on which they are based, these cupcakes are doused with a mixture of three milks (“tres leches”). Don’t worry: The cupcakes will absorb the liquid without becoming soggy, but you will need to use paper-lined foil liners (plain ones will not hold up after soaking). Airy whipped cream dusted with ground cinnamon is a finishing touch.

Count down to the new year with twelve cupcakes, each with a designated hour, arranged to suggest a clock. The hands of the clock are made from a clip-art design easily copied onto paper and cut out (see page 340). This clock has a timeless look thanks to the Roman numerals, but you can alter the style of the numbers as you please. You may also want to try your hand at piping a different letter of “Happy New Year” on another dozen cupcakes (or simply frost and serve alongside); in this case, you will need to make a full batch of buttercream.

Smaller adaptations of favorite desserts, such as raspberry-swirled cheesecake, are always appealing. Everyone gets his or her own, with plenty of buttery graham-cracker crust in each bite. Drops of fresh raspberry puree are pulled through cream-cheese batter to give the cakes a marbleized look. Baking the cupcakes in a hot-water bath produces the creamiest results and prevents the batter from sinking in the oven.

Fashioned by hand from marzipan and cradled in piped-buttercream baskets, tiny, rosy-red strawberries evoke a visit to the berry patch. A basketweave tip produces a thick weave, but you can experiment with different tips, such as ruffle or even plain tips, to create other patterns. See Sources, page 342, for where to find the tools (shown below) for forming the strawberries.

For those who like their baked goods chunky and nutty, these cupcakes, inspired by the popular bar cookies, are nearly bursting with cashews, butterscotch chips, and toffee bits. If you can’t find toffee bits, chop a small chocolate-covered toffee bar, such as Skor or Heath, to use instead.

This oh-so-cute caterpillar, made by arranging fondant-covered cupcakes in a curved line, makes a memorable arrangement for a baby’s first birthday party. Here, one jumbo cupcake is used for the head and a dozen standard cupcakes make up the body; the remaining standard cupcakes can be frosted for serving alongside or decorated as instructed below and added to the caterpillar to accommodate more guests. Or you can make two caterpillars by baking the batter in two jumbo and 26 standard cups.

A rose is not just a rose when it is lovingly piped onto a frosted cupcake to celebrate a bride-to-be, a sweetheart, or your parents on their anniversary. Besides the realistically replicated blooms, the monochromatic color scheme makes for an ultra-elegant dessert. Or, for a more casual event, pipe the flowers in one color, and frost the cupcakes with another. A flower nail is essential, as you can turn the nail with one hand while piping the roses with the other. The flowers can be refrigerated up to two days before placing them atop cupcakes.

Succulent blackberries, picked fresh from a farm or bought at a local market, are baked into golden cornmeal cupcakes for a delicious taste of summer. Serve the cakes warm from the oven or at room temperature, and pair with ice cream, if desired. Oven temperature is crucial here: If it’s any cooler than 375 degrees, the berries will sink to the bottom.

These single-serving delights are a staff favorite—not only because they are delectable, but also since they are easy to prepare. Instead of a cookie-crumb crust, a whole sandwich cookie serves as the base for each cheesecake. In addition, chopped cookies are mixed into the filling.