Katy's Reindeer Cupcakes
My friend Katy is this blog's godmother: she and her husband Josh were the ones who inspired me to start it five years ago. Just today, I noticed something awesome: Katy made reindeer cupcakes and posted them on her Facebook profile. Ironically, Katy--the food blog inspirer--does not have a food blog of her own so I insisted that she do a guest post that would explain to you, my beloved readers, how to make reindeer cupcakes of your own. Katy outright refused. Ok, she didn't outright refuse but she wasn't rushing to get it done. So I suggested we do an IM interview in which I ask her over IM chat how she made her reindeer cupcakes. What follows is what transpired.
Me: Katy, you recently made awesome reindeer cupcakes that you posted on your Facebook profile. What inspired them?
Katy: I had to make cupcakes for my kid's holiday party at preschool
Katy: At the last party the moms brought grocery store cupcakes
Katy: I was unimpressed, because I'm snobby like that
Katy: I was trying to think of something that would be really popular with the kids
Katy: And kids, I've noticed, are more about style than substance when it comes to baked goods
Me: So had you ever seen cupcakes like these before? Or was this totally your own inspiration?
Katy: I wanted to make reindeer cupcakes, and I google-imaged it
Katy: I saw some cupcakes with pretzel antlers and thought that worked well
Katy: But I didn't like the way they had made the rest of the cupcakes, so I improvised there.
Me: So tell us exactly how you made them!
Me: Please.
Katy:
1. Make chocolate cupcakes with chocolate icing. I'm going to trust that your readers can do that themselves.
2. Get a vanilla wafer and stick it on the cupcake, one side of the wafer touching the perimeter of the cupcake
(Does that make sense? I tried to write it 60 ways.)
Me: (yes that makes sense)
Katy:
3. Stick your pretzel antlers in. I thought it would be a nice touch if one dipped the pretzel fragments in chocolate, but I didn't do this. I think it would make them look smoother, though.
I just used Rold Gold pretzels, the bigger sized ones.
4. Get yourself a big red M&M. If you are not committed to specifically Rudolph cupcakes, you can get brown ones, I suppose.
I used the weird "cherry flavor" special release M&M, which I don't necessarily recommend. They taste like cough syrup to me, but my kid liked them.
I am pretty sure you could use an almond M&M or something instead. But preschools don't let you send desserts with nuts.
5. Use icing to attach the M&M to the vanilla wafer. Presto. That's your nose.
Me: Excellent
Katy:
6. Now the eyes. Take a mini-marshmallow and slice it in half. Place the two marshmallow halves in place on top of the wafer, to be the eyes? Take two brown mini-m&ms and stick them on
oops, I'll try again
Take two brown mini-M&Ms and stick them on to the mini-marshmallow halves. Wait, this is important: make sure the marshmallow halves are sticky-side up. If you do that, you don't have to use anything to attach the mini-m&ms.
Those are the reindeer's eyes, see.
Me: Wow, this is complex!
Katy:
7. It's not really that complex, Adam, don't be ridiculous.
8. Using icing (and I will admit to using store-bought black icing), make reindeer smiles underneath the nose.
I think one could use black licorice, too, but I HATE licorice.
Adam, do you have any questions?
Me: How do you get the reindeer meat into the cupcake?
Katy: Slice on the grain, brown the meat slightly before mixing it in, and then fold it into the cupcake batter right before pouring them into the pan.
Me: Sick!! I was totally kidding!
Katy: It's a chunky texture, but it works. You could substitute chocolate chips.
* * * * *
Thanks to Katy for sharing her Reindeer Cupcake technique/recipe. It's snowing here in New York, so this might be a fun project to attempt this weekend. Stay warm, everyone!
