4th of July Cupcakes

photo credit: bakingbites.com

With summer right around the corner, my favorite holiday is just about to hit. The 4th of July will yield many barbecues and other festivities and none is complete without some special 4th of July cupcakes!
Here are some great ideas for 4th of July cupcakes and frosting and decorating.

4th of July cupcakes take 1. If you're a naturalist like me, then you hate food dye. This makes baking and decorating 4th of July cupcakes difficult since we all know that you can't have 4th of July cupcakes that don't represent the red, white, and blue. This is why I'm starting off here, because if you can avoid chemically enhanced cupcakes then you should. For these 4th of July cupcakes you can use either a chocolate cupcakes, a vanilla cupcake, or a red velvet cupcake (using beet juice of course!). If you want to make these 4th of July cupcakes with vanilla cupcakes but you want the cake to be red, you can add a little beet juice in place of water. Beet juice is strong so careful!
For 4th of July cupcake I like to use vanilla frosting. That will be your white in your red, white and blue. 4th of July cupcakes should be festive, so use a vanilla frosting, cream cheese frosting, or boiled frosting and lather up those cupcakes! Now you may be wondering where your red and blue come in if you're not going to use food dye. Luckily the 4th of July is in the summer and fruit and summer go hand in hand. Decorate your 4th of July cupcakes with blueberries and raspberries. Or decorate your 4th of July cupcakes with strawberries instead of raspberries. Voila! If you want red icing, use beets! You will have marvelous natural 4th of July cupcakes that everyone will enjoy. A nice way to decorate is to make a swirl or circle of blueberries and stick a strawberry with the top cut off faced down on the top of your 4th of July cupcakes. What would really make an amazing 4th of July cupcake would be chocolate covered strawberries.
Enjoy!

4th of July cupcakes take2: Now that we've covered our natural 4th of July cupcakes, lets get down to the nitty gritty. The simple truth is, if you want blue 4th of July cupcakes, use a yellow cake and blue food dye, you want red, use a red food dye. Plain and simple. The same goes for the icing that you'll be covering your 4th of July cupcakes in. I like to keep things simple with a yellow or white 4th of July cupcakes topped with white frosting or chocolate frosting and then red, white, and blue sprinkles. If you're feeling really festive, your 4th of July cupcakes can adorn an American flag make out of sprinkles. You can also create different color frosting to top your 4th of July cupcakes and do a swirl or a patter atop your 4th of July cupcakes. They'll look really cute. Experiment! 4th of July cupcakes should be crazy and explosive, not safe and refined.

No matter how you decorate your 4th of July cupcakes, I assure you people will love them. 4th of July cupcakes will make your holiday extra special.

Come back soon for more cupcake recipes!

Love,
The Cupcake Gal