How not to make a Frankenstein Easter Bunny

With my Easter cupcake class overly full (okay, if anyone is desperate I can take ONE more person - but that's it!!!!) I had to get around to designing my own special Easter Bunny to sit atop one of the cupcakes that I'm planning to teach.

 This was my final bunny. He's fat and happy, he has a few little Easter eggs to give out to passing children, and at the moment, he's nestled on a green cupcake top in the middle of a crop of baby rocket leaves. I thought this would be likely to make him a happy bunny.


















This was the bunny model that I started off with. I have to tell you that I have no idea where this bunny came from. He's been sitting on top of my computer terminal at work for about a year and my best guess is that I found him by chance somewhere and installed him in his work position because of his goofy teeth and ridiculous ears. I love the lil guy.















So I set about trying to copy him in fondant. Here are my tools - the bunny, a box of premixed fondant, cornflour in a shaker, and some brown gel colouring.



What can I say except that modelling the bunny was somewhat harder than I thought it would be? I ended up with Frankenstein Bunny. His ears were kooky, his teeth were massive and crooked, his stature was small and his eyes were just plain crazy. A friend suggested to me that perhaps this was the Easter Bunny having delivered his eggs and tucked into the leftover Christmas brandy.

Time to try again. This time I thought strategically. Bunny needed to be simpler. Two balls of brown fondant, onew for his head and one for his tummy; Two ears made regular with cutters; a better, 'bunnier' nose; and less mad eyes. I started by using a tiny elliptical cutter for the ears. The cutter is about 12mm long.

I then used the same cutter with some pink fondant, but cut each elliptical piece of pink vertically so it was only half the width of the brown piece. I flattened out the brown piece by hand, stuck the pink piece in the middle of it with a touch of water, and inserted a 1cm length of florist's wire at the base so that I would be able to attach the earts to the bunny's head. I left these to dry sitting at the edge of a piece of foam so they would curve inwards slightly at the top.

 

It was time to make two circles of brown for the body and head. I stuck these together, then added a couple of timy brown balls for his feet and sliced them with a knife to look like paws; then I stuck on two pick circles for his muzzle, and two small white dots for his eyes. I put a few needle marks in his pink muzzle before it got too hard - these were in preparation for the whiskers.

The little darling was looking a bit porky, but I pressed on. I made two little arms and stuck them around his body with water. I gave him black pupils, floral wire whiskers and attached his ears before giving him a little tufty tail (not seen here) made of white fondant.

Sorted! A fat, happy, Easter bunny on a green base, all ready for Easter! (Now to teach my class members these skillss - but psst.... I've made it a bit easier for them... I plan to supply ready-made ears and teeth for those who can't master them ....

Happy (early) Easter from Dr Cupcake!

 

 

 

 

Easter Cupcake and Cakepop Workshop

EASTER with DR CUPCAKE!

Easter Cupcakes and Cakepops Workshop

Hatching Chick Cupcake

Dr Cupcake would like to welcome you to participate in a special hands-on workshop for Easter this year!


In this special three-hour workshop, you’ll learn all the techniques necessary to decorate the four sweet treats pictured – Hatching Chick Cupcake, Chickie Cakepop, Eggs in a Nest Cupcake and Easter Bunny Cupcake.

Easter bunny cupcake hiding in rocket shoots

Suitable for beginners, still applicable for those with some experience. Techniques you’ll learn include working with rolled fondant, making solid fondant figures, forming and dipping cakepops in liquid icing, and simple decorating techniques. At the end, you get to take your sweet masterpieces home and gift them as Easter pressies, or eat them straightaway!

 

This workshop occurs the weekend before Easter, but due to the longlasting nature of the particular recipes and decorations used, these treats will be easily kept until the following week, to give as Easter gifts or provide a lovely centrepiece.

Follow-up help and advice is always available on this blog.

Chick Pops

All cupcakes, cakepops, materials and equipment provided. You may wish to bring an apron. You will be taking home the three cupcakes and three cakepops that you have decorated, so please bring a plastic container.

 

 

Eggs in a nest cupcake

This workshop is suitable for adults and for children 12 and above.
The workshop needs between 10 and 12 participants to make it viable. Waiting lists are available for participants that are not in the first twelve to apply and these people will receive first preference in any future workshops.
 

Cost: $60 per person (adult), $45 per person (under 18 / unwaged, seniors).

Bookings essential. Pay on the day.

When: Saturday 23 March, 11am– 2pm ( a short break will be included to get a coffee or snack)

Where: Meeting Room, Salamanca Arts Centre (1st floor), Salamanca Place, Hobart
What to bring: Yourself and an apron if you're worried about your clothes. A plastic container to bear your spoils awat with you.

How do I book? As soon as possible - please note that spaces are limited.

 

Please contact

 wootton.astrid@gmail.com

 or text 0409 190 890 to reserve a place. You will receive a return text or email confirming your place in the course.

Brought to you by Dr Cupcake.

 

Cupcaking our way to Bushfire Recovery

This summer there were terrible bushfires in Tasmania, the lovely island I call home, and many people were left without homes, stock, fencing or other basic needs that many of us take for granted. Fortunately Tasmanians (and Australians in general) are a generous bunch, and fundraising began immediately to try to help out those in need.
As I pondered the fires, the following image came into my head:

 Yes, I thought of piggywig cupcakes.

I thought specifically of how piggywig cupcakes might be able to raise a bit of money for bushfire recovery.

And I came up with a charity cupcake workshop!

And so I found myself in the office meeting room (kindly donated for the purpose by the boss) this Saturday, with a fantastic group of people who wanted to contribute some funds to the bushfire recovery whilst learning how to decorate cupcakes.

 

In addition to piggywigs, I thought it would be fun to make some elephants....

....And some tigers.

The workshop went very well, largely because everyone was united in a common goal. We spent two very detailed hours doing our cupcaking - this is Alice doing some very careful work on tiger whiskers.

I suddenly realised to my horror that the scheduled time was up, and we were only halfway through the tiger! It seemed cruel to leave the little fella unfinished, so we worked on for another 20 minutes or so to get him finished.

 

And then there was much rejoicing.

This is me taking a photo of Peta, who is taking a photo of her piggywig.

This is Gail displaying her three finished cupcakes - they looked fantastic!

And this is the lovely Charys, one of the youngest participants, who did incredibly well with her cupcakes, and was the fastest worker out of all of us.















Thanks to everybody who participated - together with Piggywig, Elephant and Tiger, we raised $460 for bushfire relief!

Keep cupcaking!

Dr Cupcake