Puppy Dog Cupcakes!

My little sister turned 10!  Becca, along with my entire family, are huge dog fans! We love all dogs of all ages, shapes, and sizes.  So I was inspired by my Hello Cupcake book to make an army of Westie dog cupcakes.  Here is one of the adorable little buggers:

This recipe made 12 big cupcakes and 24 mini cupcakes but you can make more big ones and less little if you like.  It's all up to you!  The cupcakes definitely have some personality and looked so hilarious all lined up on the platter. 

As you can see I used the extra frosting and mini cupcakes to make decorations around the edge of the platter including paw prints and dog bones.

This recipe is going to be for vanilla cupcakes and a cream cheese frosting that you can pipe quite easily.  I also cheated and bought one can of chocolate frosting in order to save time and used it on some of the cupcakes (both alone and tie dyed with the cream cheese frosting).

I am finally home from college for a long month so be expecting lots of posts in the next few weeks! I am so happy to finally have a break from the craziness and be able to spend valuable time with my family and friends. 

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas and that Santa Claus was good to you.

Once again, I would like to acknowledge "Hello Cupcake" and Glorious Treats blog for this recipe!

Ingredients:

This recipe makes 12 normal cupcakes and 24 mini cupcakes.

For the vanilla cupcakes: 

2½ cups all purpose flour

2 tsp. baking powder

2 tps. baking soda

½ tsp. salt

½ cup milk

½ cup vegetable oil

1 tsp. vanilla

1 stick of unsalted butter, softened

1 cup sugar

3 eggs

For cream cheese frosting: 

1 stick of butter (at room temp, but still cool)

8 oz. cream cheese (chilled)

1 tsp. vanilla 

4 cups powdered sugar

1-2 tbsp. heavy whipping cream

Other items needed:

A bag of mini marshmallows

Mini chocolate chips

Red jelly beans 

Small pink sprinkles 

Food coloring

Ziploc bags, tape, and scissors for piping bags

Directions:

For the vanilla cupcakes:

Preheat the oven to 350. Line one normal sized cupcake pan and two mini cupcake pans with cupcake liners.

Combine the dry ingredients: flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.

Also in a separate bowl combine wet ingredients: milk, oil, and vanilla.

In an electric mixer beat butter and sugar for a few minutes until smooth and creamy. 

Add eggs one at a time on medium speed.

Turn down to low speed and alternate additions of dry and wet mixtures (beginning and ending with the dry ingredients).

Beat well until fully combined. 

Fill each cupcake liner about 2/3 full with batter.

The mini cupcakes will take 8-10 minutes to cook while the normal sized cupcakes will take about 15-18 minutes (or until toothpick inserted comes out clean).

Remove from the oven and allow to cool completely before proceeding.

For the cream cheese frosting:

Cream butter in an electric mixer slightly for about a minute and then add in the cream cheese and mix together until combined. 

Add in the vanilla and powdered sugar until it gets fluffy (don't worry it will be a bit clumpy for a few minutes but just continue to mix on medium speed). 

Start by adding one tablespoon of heavy whipping cream and beating for 1 minute (add more if it is not the consistency you are looking for). 

Make sure to keep it refrigerated once you're done!

I also died about half of it a light orange color by using orange and brown food coloring. 

Assembly of the dogs:

To create the "fur" effect with the frosting you will need to use Ziploc bags and reinforce one of the corners on each bag with a few layers of scotch tape.  Then you will need to cut a small M-shape into that corner.  Fill various bags with your frostings.  In my case I had some plain white, orange, chocolate/brown, and mixtures of the three.  To create a 2-tone frosting place the 2 different colors of your choosing side by side in the piping bag and it will give you this effect.

For the ears you will need to cut 12 mini marshmallows diagonally.  The inside of them will be sticky so you will dip the sticky part into a bowl of small pink sprinkles and set them aside. 

Beginning with the face of the dog, secure the 2 ears on the rim of the cupcake with frosting.  Using another mini marshmallow (that has 1/3 of it removed) for the snout/nose of the dog secure it somewhere around the middle of the mini cupcake. Using the piping bag cover the entire mini cupcake with frosting.  Start on the surface of the cake while applying pressure and pull away quickly while releasing pressure.  For the eyes and nose, use mini chocolate chips, and for the tongue cut a red jelly bean in half and place directly below the snout. 

For the body of the dog, use a large cupcake and create fur like lines using the piping bags. Start in the center of the cupcake and move towards the edges with the frosting.  You may need to experiment a bit in trying to figure out if you want long or short fur and how to make the frosting look how you want. 

Place the mini cupcake on its side on top of the bigger cupcake.

These cupcakes definitely take some patience but they are fun and adorable!

I really hope you all decide to try these out! What is cuter than a little doggie cupcake! Let me know if you have an questions, concerns, or comments, as always. 

Merry Christmas and Happy Baking!