The Challenge Begins!

Today, I baked my first batch of cupcakes, and decorated one set!

Set #1: "Pastel Patterns"

Before, I had to prepare. To start, I bought all of the ingredients I needed at the local grocery store and candy store. My mother gave me an old cake decoration book, and it had some great tips! Next, I surfed the web for some tutorials and inspirations. Then, I drew out some sketches of ideas. Planning took much longer than expected- I had to determine colour, what design I would do, what supplies would I need, what skills would I learn, and so on. After that, I started baking!

I practiced decorating on some parchment paper, and that proved to be quite useful. I decorated a set (5 cupcakes) in the theme of patterns. I chose to do pastel colours; pink, blue, and white was the colour scheme. Here are my inspirations (mind you, I used icing, while these decorators used fondant):

http://treatsastastytaters.blogspot.ca/2011/10/cupcake.html 

http://cupcakestakethecake.blogspot.ca/2008/05/cupcake-interview-with-hello-naomi.html

http://www.thepolkadotcupcake.co.za/gallery/polka_dot_325/

I came across a few hurdles, but managed to overcome and learn from them. First, when I was dipping the cupcakes in soft frosting, I realized the paper cups on the cupcakes were too big and that caused some issues. However, I managed to ice the cupcakes and it didn't turn out so bad. Next time, I will make sure to fill the cups up exactly 2/3 or more, to ensure the cupcakes rise over the cups. Second, when I was decorating one cupcake, the pattern didn't come out as expected. The reason was because the piping tool was a little too large. To cover up my mistakes, I did a different pattern on top of it- it looked fine!

Overall I had a wonderful time decorating my first set of cupcakes, and I will definitely put my skills and techniques to use when I decorate the next sets soon!