Cupcakes for a Swim Banquet

So I'll go ahead and say it...seems funny to have the word *pink* in my blog title and my first post has nothing pink in it.  Oh well. 

My sons had a swim banquet this past weekend, that included a potluck, and I signed up to bring a dessert.  Cupcakes, being a finger food, seem to work well for this kind of thing.  I wanted to try my hand at fondant, which I've been playing around with lately.  I decided to try to make the team swim cap in fondant as a decoration.  What came in handy was that I was assigned to help with the toddlers during our homeschool group Lent retreat.  One of the things we were playing with was playdough.  So, while I was hanging out doing playdough with the toddlers I played around with the shape I was looking for, since fondant is kind of like baker's playdough.   Here is what I came up with when I actually went to cut out the fondant.

I cut a hand-drawn template for the swim cap out of an index card (very bottom center of above picture).  Then, I used bright yellow fondant and edible blue food marker because that is what their team swim caps look like.  Here is a picture of their actual team cap.  You can be the judge at how close I got.

I actually liked much better the way the fondant cut-outs looked before I put them on the cupcake.  I felt that once I put them on the cupcake they were a bit unrecognizable.  I need to work on visualizing the shape once it's placed on the cupcake.  Or I just need to work on better placement.  Maybe both.  Anyway, here is the finished product.

And then I threw in some chocolate cupcakes with a homemade peanut butter frosting because, well, who doesn't like chocolate and peanut butter.  Topped, of course, with miniature peanut butter cups.  The frosting on the swim cap cupcakes is a homemade vanilla bean vanilla frosting.  I used both vanilla extract and real organic vanilla bean.  The flavor is amazing and, frankly, it looks more fancy with the vanilla specks running through it.  Unfortunately, you can't see that in this picture.



I guess they turned out pretty well.  They all gotten eaten anyway. 

For the peanut butter frosting, I mixed 1/2 cup of peanut butter, 1/2 cup of organic vegetable shortening, a teaspoon of vanilla, and 2 tablespoons of milk in a standing mixer with the whisk attachment.  Once it was all blended well, I added one 16 oz. box of powdered sugar.  This was not blending very well so I added some more milk.  That did the trick to help blend it better, but then it was a little thinner than I wanted it.  I added a bit more powdered sugar and that did the trick.  I think you just need to play around with it until it reaches the consistency you're looking for.  Once I got the right consistency, I let it mix up for a few minutes to get it light and fluffy.

I'm hoping to do some type of American Girl cupcakes for my daughter's birthday to share with her friends at her American Girl club.  Right now I'm thinking some type of pink frosting and a fondant star topper.  Hope to be posting in a couple of weeks.