Hey There, Cupcake! 35 Yummy Fun Cupcake Recipes for All Occasions

by Clare Crespo, Eric Staudenmaier (Photographer)

Cupcakes have captivated the nation, and Clare Crespo makes them like no one else. Crespo bakes up trompe l'oeil cupcakes for every occasion, proving they can look like balls of yarn, fried eggs, or peppermint candies - and taste just as fantastic as they look. Cute, accessible, and colorful, this cookbook contains 35 wildly inventive recipes, Cupcake Chocolate and yellow cupcakes sliced and frosted to look like a burger topped with lettuce and tomato on a sesame seed bun; Caramel cupcakes frosted to look like a koala, panda, and grizzly bears; Pollination Honey-flavored cupcakes frosted to look like flowers, topped with candy bees; Six-Pack Cola-flavored cupcakes stacked and iced to look like a six-pack of soda. In her acclaimed debut title, The Secret Life Of Food, Crespo created recipes that rallied families to approach birthdays, holidays, and picnics with devilish creativity. Enthusiasm for Crespo and her food creations landed the irrespressible author on Today, Good Morning America, and a raft of cable shows, including the Food Network's Extreme Cuisine, Top 5 and Roker on the Road; HGTV's Smart Solutions; and the Style Network's You're Invited. The book also garnered high praise in publications as diverse as Vanity Fair, Rolling Stone, Newsweek, and the Los Angeles Times Magazine, among others.

Genres: Cookbooks

80 pages, Hardcover

First published October 1, 2004

Reviews

[D'Anne]

This book is so much fun. Say goodbye to boring cupcakes. The ideas are SO cute that you'll want to try almost all of them. I need to make more friends so I have more birthdays to bake cupcakes for. Warning, though, the decorations aren't always easy and some prior cake decorating experience is a help. She offers her own cupcake and frosting recipes, but you can also do it the lazy way with a box mix if you're going for presentation over taste, or use your own recipe for special dietary needs. I adapt the recipies to make them vegan using soy milk and egg replacer. My wife and I made the sushi cupcakes for a friend's birthday (shreded coconut for the rice, green Fruit Roll Ups for seaweed, and Sweedish fish candies, etc) and presented them to her on Japanese dishes we'd bought. It was a big hit and made her very happy. These creative cupcakes are a great gift - and one from the heart - for that person who is hard to buy for. Make them for someone you love or get the book for a person who loves to bake.

[Melissa]

Many adorable, yummy ideas.

[Rae]

Good ideas... some of them

[Just - The romance reader]

Cute ideas, and a great gift for a cupcake loving baker like myself.