Our friend and neighbor Kali is getting married in August and so these are for her wedding shower this afternoon.  The recipe/instructions come from the cookbook “Hello, Cupcake!” by Karen Tack and Alan Richardson.  I used a “Funfetti” cake mix and baked the cupcakes per the instructions on the box in mini muffin pans and ended up with almost 6 dozen mini cupcakes then I followed their instructions for the decorating.

25 mini vanilla cupcakes baked in white paper liners

1 (16 oz) can vanilla frosting (we used 2 cans since we had so many cupcakes)

red, yellow, purple, neon green and blue food coloring (we went with yellow, teal, pink and purple)

1  Spoon 1/4 cup vanilla frosting into a ziploc bag, press out excess air and seal.  Divide remaining frosting into 5 small microwavable bowls.  Tint each bowl a different pastel color with food coloring.  Cover frostings until ready to use to prevent them from drying out.

2  Line cookie sheet with wax paper.  Working with 1 bowl of frosting at a time, heat in microwave, stirring frequently, until it is the texture of lightly whipped cream, 4 – 5 seconds.  (In order to get the frosting smooth and dippable, we had to microwave about 10 – 15 seconds.)

3  Holding a cupcake by its paper liner, dip it into frosting just up to edge of liner, 5 cupcakes of each color.  After dipping, hold cupcake above surface and allow excess frosting to drip back into bowl.  Carefully invert cupcake and place on cookie sheet.  If frosting becomes too thick, microwave for several seconds, stirring frequently.

4  Snip a 1/16″ corner from bag with vanilla frosting.  Pipe small decorations on each cupcake, using same decorations on each set of colors (keep decorations minimal for more sophisticated look).

5  Arrange cupcakes on serving platter in 5 rows of 5 cupcakes.