Page 27 - Cupcakes

DECORATING PENS: Available from WilliamsSonoma and other on-line
outlets, these are pen-like tubes filled with white chocolate decorating frosting in
luscious colors like lavender, orange, and sage green, as well as white. Use these
to write names or make faces on cupcakes after they are frosted. You immerse
the frosting-filled pens in hot tap water for 5 minutes, then snip off the top and
pipe away. The beauty of these pens is that the frosting hardens and you can tote
the decorated cupcakes without smudging the writing. Gel frosting pens are
found in grocery stores, but the consistency of the frosting is, not surprisingly,
more gel-like and not quite as nice.

CHOCOLATE CURLS: All you need to make luscious curls is a swivel-
headed vegetable peeler and a bar of chocolate, white or dark, at room
temperature. The larger the surface on which to drag the peeler, the larger the
curl, and the warmer the chocolate, the larger the curl. Small squares of cold
chocolate will yield chocolate shavings. And these, too, are pretty, piled up in the
center of a frosted cupcake.

INSTANT DECORATIONS: My friend Lucille Osborn, a cake decorating
expert, creates just about any design to top a cupcake by first drawing a pattern,
then placing it under parchment paper (the pattern is dark enough to be seen
through the parchment). She melts chocolate or colored confectionery coating
wafers (Wilton calls them Candy Melts), found at baking stores or online, and