Cupcake cakes are easy to make and even easier to eat… just pull a cupcake off the cake and enjoy it! Since Thanksgiving is just around the corner around here I decided to make a fun Thanksgiving Turkey Cupcake Cake and show you how easy it is to do it in this tutorial. I hope this gives you some inspiration as you head into the kitchen to make something sweet for Thanksgiving Day!
A few useful tips before we get started… you can pipe the turkey’s plumage using a rose petal tip (#104, #126 Wilton petal tips); just pipe rose petals or a ruffle pattern all the way around the turkey, starting on the outer edge. Here’s a good video tutorial that shows you the various patterns you can pipe using a rose petal tip. However, for these patterns you need to use a firmer frosting otherwise your petals or ruffles won’t hold their shape. This Easy Buttercream Icing Recipe from Moms and Munchkins would work in this case.
Most cream cheese frostings are a little too soft for piping petals or ruffles so in this case the type of tip you’re using doesn’t matter as much as they won’t hold their shape anyways. We prefer cream cheese frosting on our cupcakes or cakes so that’s what I’m using in this tutorial as well. I used different tips to pipe the plumage as I didn’t have 4 that were the same to make the 4 different colours (burgundy, red, orange and yellow). I had two #104 tips and two #63 curved petal tips and I bet by looking at the cupcake cake you can’t tell the difference, am I right? You can also use some other medium-sized decorating tips like the #12 round tip or one of the shell tips.
Materials & Tools:
- 15 cupcakes, 4 mini cupcakes and white frosting of your choice – I used Lemon Blueberry Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting from Annie’s Eats
- Burgundy, red, orange, yellow and brown paste food colouring
- 5 piping bags (ziplock bags work as well)
- 4 medium-sized decorating tips – you can use #104, #126 or #63 petal tips, #12 round tips
- 1 fine round decorating tip for writing the ‘Eat Beef’ message– I used #3 Wilton tip
- Decorating tips to pipe the legs, beak and the body shape – you can use the same petal tip #104 for the legs and beak and #10 round tip for the body
- 2 candy eyes
Directions:
Bake your cupcakes and make the cream cheese frosting. Colour your frosting as follows:
- Save 1 tablespoon of white frosting
- Colour 3 generous tablespoons of frosting in brown
- Divide the remaining frosting in equal parts and place in separate bowls; add burgundy and red food colour to the 1st bowl, red to the 2nd one, orange to the 3rd one and yellow to the last one.
Arrange the cupcakes on a cake board as seen in the photo below.
Fill 4 piping bags fitted with the medium-sized petal tips with your brown, red, orange and yellow frosting.
Start with the burgundy frosting and pipe “rose petals” from the outside in. To do this, hold your piping bag with the wide end of the tip facing down. Squeeze the bag while pivoting the narrow end to the right and releasing pressure to create a petal.
Now, add another row of red petals, overlapping slightly with the burgundy row. Add another red row of petals making sure you overlap slightly as you pipe the petals.
Pipe the orange petals overlapping slightly the red ones then another row of orange petals. I started making more like a ruffle /zig-zag pattern but you get the idea.
Pipe two more rows (semicircles) of yellow petals/ruffles. As you can see, your semicircles are getting smaller and smaller.
When you’re finished with your plumage use a piping bag filled with brown frosting and fitted with a #10 round tip to make the turkey’s body.
Use orange frosting to create the turkey’s beak using the orange frosting and #104 petal tip. Place the eyes.
Pipe the turkey snoods using some red frosting and the same #104 petal tip.
Lastly pipe a white banner or just use a small spatula to make it and write “Eat Beef” using the #3 tip and brown frosting. I bet you feel bad for Turkeys now and you’re having beef for your Thanksgiving dinner:-P!
Oh, I almost forgot to mention, you can make some “grass” on your cake board using green frosting!
