I love to cook and bake. I love the way homemade food tastes, and I’m doing my best to pass that love to the wee ones. And right now, it’s working. I do my best to ensure that cooking isn’t just drudgery and a chore but something they can have fun with and look forward to. Super-Duper Cupcakes: Sweet and Easy Cupcake Decorating was a perfect break from learning things like mashed potatoes and browning ground beef, much as Mister Man has enjoyed those lessons.
When we invited a friend and her daughter over for dinner, we immediately agreed that the kids would make dessert for us – with our supervision. The kids all thought this was a brilliant idea, and there was a heated debate over what cupcake design to choose. There are so many in Super-Duper Cupcakes. I leaned towards Delicious Daisies while Mister Man wanted to create Swimming Fish. In the end, both of those were rejected, along with Racing Cars and the Moonlight Kitty in favor of something that allowed the kids to express their own personalities.
They decided to go with My Shining Star on a Deep Dark Chocolate cupcake.
Of course, before we got to that point, we had to actually make the cupcakes themselves. The children took turns adding the ingredients, and they learned important things like why you alternate milk and flour in making cakes and why you scrape down a bowl. I’m just proud that they managed to crack the eggs without getting any shells into the batter and didn’t fight over whose turn it was to add the next ingredient.
Cooking together helps with so many skills from sharing to social interactions to math (especially those pesky fractions) and reading. I loved how they worked together and then had the patience to wait for the cupcakes to finish baking and cool before we decorated using ideas from the book.
When it was time to decorate, I appreciated how the cookbook gave us a model but then freedom to work within the model to get creative and express their personalities. After making their own star shaped cookie cutters (because sadly, mine were too big), they decided that they wanted to make other shapes, too. So we ended up with Puffle cupcakes and Pac-Man cupcakes, too.
They were so excited that they figured out how to do this all on their own and they were so proud to eat their creations and have us share in their celebration. This is what food is about – the celebration and enjoyment with friends and family.
 We’re already planning our next get together to make another dinner with our friends. And this time, we’re going to be a little more adventuresome with our decorating now that we’ve gained some confidence. I’m pretty sure that Delicious Daisies received the most votes, so I’ve added mini marshmallows and chocolate candies to my shopping list.
See more details in my review of Super-Duper Cupcakes at 5 Minutes for Books.
You can enter to win a copy of this book. Just follow the instructions in the rafflectoper below and see how you can earn several entries (including by leaving a comment on the companion post at 5 Minutes for Books.
Written by staff 5 Minutes for Books contributor: Regardless of the occasion, Michelle is always looking for an excuse to cook or bake, and maybe she can start to make things look pretty instead of just being tasty with some of these ideas. See what she’s cooking up on her blog Honest & Truly! or follow along with her on Twitter where she is also @HonestAndTruly.
I love cup cake, especially made by me and my wife. we often cook together in holiday, my wife love to cook and I love to eat.
I love chocolate cupcakes.
My Favorite Cupcake flavor is for sure Chocolate!
I like spice cake cupcakes made with a bit of applesauce.
My favorite are lemon cupcakes!
I love vanilla.
i like white cupcakes with white frosting, i’m very vanilla, LOL!
Lemon is my favorite.
For me, it’s red velvet!
I love carrot cake cupcakes!
I love Peanut Butter or Funfetti!
Sour cream chocolate
Red velvet is my fav.
red velvet cream cheese frosting lots of sprinkles
i love white vanilla!!!!
I love Red Velvet CupCakes
I like chocolate
Chocolate is my favorite
Red Velvet is my favorite cupcake flavor!
I like vanilla cupcakes.
My favorite is Chocolate with buttercream frosting.
Chocolate! With chocolate frosting!
I love yellow cake cupcakes
Gotta love the flash of red velvet, but I love the basic yellow cupcake topped with any of a variety of decadent chocolate frostings.
Chocolate is my favorite cupcake flavor!
Vanilla is my fave type of cupcake
peanut butter
vmkids3 at msn dot com
I love vanilla with a buttercream frosting
I like red velvet cupcakes
Red velvet is my fave cupcake flavor
chocolate fudge with wiltons filling and frosting thank you for the giveaway
chocolate with caramel filling
Chocolate for me!
Any kind with Peanut Butter!
I like strawberry.
Carrot or vanilla.
chocolate with vanilla frosting and coconut on top
I love vanilla cupcakes
chocolate is my favorite
Chocolate always wins out!
I love red velvet!
I love chocolate cupcakes with peanut butter frosting
Guess I am not very original but my favorite cupcake has to be chocolate with chocolate fudge frostening and chocolate pudding in middle. I guess I just like chocolate..
Can’t beat a good chocolate cupcake!
I like strawberry cupcakes.
I’m a fan of red velvet or anything banana.
I like chocolate cupcakes.
strawberry is my favorite
Plain vanilla is my favorite!
I am a fan of gold cupcakes with vanilla buttercream. Thanks for the chance.
I love Devil’s Food!
I love EVERYTHING with vanilla butter cream icing! 🙂
I like yellow cupcakes with the rainbow vanilla frosting!
i love chocolate
chocolate is our favorite
I like chocolate.
I love vanilla flavored cupcakes!
My favorite flavor is Vanilla
I like carrot cake cupcakes.
I love whipped chocolate frosting on either a yellow cupcake or a chocolate cupcake.
love strawberry flavored cupcake
I like cook books with detailed explanation and pictures.
I like carrot cake cupcakes.
Lemon is my favorite.
I love chocolate the best!
I love chocolate cupcakes with chocolate frosting– the richer the better!
Just plain old chocolate.
I love banana with cream cheese frosting
I like lemon
Vanilla
Thanks for the chance
Chocolate with buttercream frosting
I always go with straight chocolate. This looks like one that would be really popular in my middle school.
I love chocolate cake or cup-cakes.
Carrot cake is my favorite
Definitely red velvet! 🙂