Cupcake Toppers for Christmas Part 2

This is a continuation of my previous POST on Christmas toppers for your cupcakes or cakes. This time I will be using a silicone mould.

Here are the things you will be needing: 

1. Colored gumpaste 

2. Crisco or any vegetable shortening 

3. Small artist's brush

4. Cutting mat 

5. Black food writer 

6. Small ball tool. 

7. Silicone Mould.

With a small brush, dab a little shortening into the cavity. This will prevent the gumpaste or fondant (50/50 or 60/40 ratio of gumpaste to fondant) from sticking in the mould.

 

For SANTA, start with his mustache. Take a tiny amount of White gumpaste/fondant just enough that will fit in the mustache mould. Second, take a flesh colored gumpaste/fondant for Santa's lips. Same with the mustache, fill in the tiny cavity with just enough flesh colored gumpaste. Push it in with a dresden tool or the veiner tool.

Next is Santas eyebrow and the white fur of his hat. Again, fill it in with white gumpaste/fondant. Always remember to fill it just enough. If you go over, it will not be a good sight .

Next is Santa's face. With a flesh colored gumpaste/fondant fill in the face cavity.

Fill in the remaining cavity with red for Santa's hat and white for the beard and puffy ball of his hat.

If your fondant/gumpaste is a little tacky, you need to leave it first for a while to dry a bit before you can use it to fill. By doing so, It will be easier to unmold it from the silicone mould.

Always remember when working with gumpaste, it dries fast so you need to work fast. Once the surface dries out, you need to dab a tiny bit of water or gum glue to moisten it so that it will bind with the other components.

Once the gumpaste is ready, unmold the gumpaste. Do not wait for the gumpaste to completely dry before unmolding, it will surely break. Here goes!!!

 

TADA!!! see Santa's white brow ? I love this mould!

Now for the eyes, you can paint it with black food marker or you can get a tiny black gumpaste and roll it into a ball and stick it in or if you have a black nonpareil you can use them too as Santa's eyes

                                                                     HO! HO! HO!

 
For the Reindeer...

TADA!! I wasn't able to make the snowman. It was too time consuming because of the tiny parts.

Hope you all enjoyed it.

Until next time :)
Donna

Cupcake Toppers for Christmas Part 1

I know it is still early to think of Christmas but can't help myself getting excited since I'm really looking forward to see my family again. 

Last year, I made some cupcakes as gifts for Christmas and sold some. Since there were not much cupcake toppers available in our area (that I liked :D ), I decided to make my own. I got the inspirations from the internet. I used some simple cutters and a silicone mould that I got from Bake et al, an online shop for all your cake decorating needs!. I will make a separate blog for the silicone mold. 


So, here goes! You will need the following:

I wanted to make Santa's beard stand out so, I colored my marshmallow fondant with Americolor Bright White.

Hope you could see the difference. Can you?

To start. Roll out a skin toned fondant thinly. Here, I used the biggest cutter from the round and wavy edge double sided cutter set. If your fondant is still tacky and soft, leave it a while before moving it to avoid stretching it. When it's firm, use a pallet knife (I used #1007) to lift it and placed on my work mat. Set aside.

 

 
With the wavy edge of the cutter, cut white fondant. this will be Santa's beard. Use the round edge to cut other parts "band", #10 or #12 round piping tip for Santa's hat.

Mustache, Lip and Beard.

Santa's Hat. If the fondant shrunk or short in height, carefully roll it out with a rolling pin to make it longer. As you can see Santa already looked cute even if he's bald :)

Attach remaining parts. You can leave the band as is or cut the sides for a different look. It's up to you  :)

Now the Snowman head with earmuffs 

If the band is thick, you can always trim it down to desired width. Same goes with the ear muffs.

Attach remaining parts. And Tada!

Snowman #2 with winter bonnet.

 

Using the same cutter used on Santa's face, cut through...

Use the same round cutter to cut and shape the other parts of the bonnet.

 

  

NOTES:

1. For this project, I used a marshmallow fondant (MMF) with fondant improver to stabilize the shape of my toppers. I prefer to use MMF because it tastes better than rolled fondant. You may use tylose powder just make sure to knead the sugar dough properly so the tylose powder will completely dissolved.  You can also make these by using gumpaste.

2. Do not refrigerate the toppers with the cupcakes. Place them on your cupcakes as soon as the buttercream comes at room temperature.   


Hope you learned something and ENJOY! 

Donna