Smaller portions are popular and give customers an excuse to treat themselves. These fall cupcake and cookie designs are sure to spark their interest.
In the fall, customers go crazy for novelty designs in Bob Brougham's bakery, The Cakery, North Aurora, Ill. Your customers are sure to enjoy these cookie and cupcake designs that are ideal treats in the chilly weather. Whether it's a turkey that makes a great table decoration, stacked cupcakes that work well for weddings or the ever-popular cupcake pull-apart cakes, these fun and easy ideas will rake in additional sales.
For a turkey design, use a quick icer to ice the bottom of a round sugar cookie with white icing. Smooth the icing with a spatula, and then place candy corn around 3/4 of the cookie's edge. You can alternate brown candy with the traditional tri-color corn for a more colorful turkey.
Slice off the edge of a doll-shaped cake. (You also can use a jumbo cupcake and mould it into the slightly oval shape.) Place the flat side of the cake on the cookie with the cut edge away from the candy corn. Use tip No. 104 with the thin side down to pipe ruffles for feathers around the turkey's body. Create the brown icing by using a mixture of chocolate, brown and orange icings.
After covering the entire body with ruffled feathers, set the turkey right side up on a cake board. (The cut edge allows the turkey stand upright.) Use tip No. 10 and the brown icing to pipe a loop that ends in a ball for the neck and head of the turkey. With tip No. 5, pipe two question marks to form the red wattle. Pipe a yellow or gold beak with tip No. 5.
With No. 43 double tip, pipe white eyes. (You also can pipe two white dots with tip No. 3.) Add black irises and eyebrows with tip No. 3 to finish the turkey.
For a stacked autumn cupcake display, ice mini, standard and jumbo size cupcakes with tip No. 12. Pipe the icing in concentric circles and smooth with a spatula. You can use any color the customer requests.
Roll the edges of the standard and jumbo cupcakes in topping, and dip the entire top of the mini cupcake in topping. You can use any topping the customer requests or fits your color scheme. The ones used here are mini chocolate chips, praline crunch and chopped pecans; all of which work for a fall display.
While the icing is still tacky, stack the cupcakes from largest to smallest. Use spaghetti to hold the cupcakes together.
Coat melted chocolate onto a plastic leaf mould. Once dry, peal the chocolate off the mould.
Paint the chocolate leaf with gold luster dust, and insert a leaf onto the top of the stacked cupcakes.
For an autumn tree cupcake, use tip No. 233 to ice the top of a standard size cupcake.
Pipe tree branches using tip No. 16 and brown royal icing. Allow the branches to dry for four to six hours or place them in the oven on low heat.
To add leaves to the branches, pipe brown icing on the branch tips and roll them in sugar leaves. Insert the branches into the center of the cupcake.
Sprinkle sugar leaves on the grass to complete the design. You also can leave the branches bare of leaves.
For a cupcake pull-apart design, bake cupcakes in a loaf pan. Place the liners into the pan, and then pour in the batter. By using a shaped pan, you can easily achieve the outline of a shaped pull-apart cake. After baking, place a board over the cupcakes, and flip them out of the pan. Then, turn them right side up onto a cake board.
Use tip No. 12 to pipe ropes of icing to look like kernels of corn. Pipe yellow along the outside of the ear of corn. Fill in the remainder of the ear using a variety of colors, such as orange and red in addition to yellow, to create Indian corn. Leave the bottom corners free of kernels to make room for the cornhusk.
Pipe green husks using leaf tip No. 70.
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BOB BROUGHAM has more than 30 years of cake decorating experience, and he has owned The Cakery in North Aurora, Ill. for 18 years. He is a mostly self-taught decorator who made the switch to baking after attending culinary school and working as a chef. He has competed in Chicago-area competitions and recently participated in a cake decorating challenge on the TLC series Ultimate Cake Off.
