THE MAKING OF THE YANKEES (CUPCAKES)

ANOTHER ATTEMPT AT MAKING A BASEBALL TEAM (OF CUPCAKES)

Okay, so, I had another baseball themed order and again for the Yankees. You would think I would have it down by now. First problem was I didn't have the dark blue food gel I needed, bad mistake and very unprofessional on my part--however, i made the best of the sitch and used black--i think it was a good substitute (though hubby didn't agree, lol). Anyway, once again, I started a day before and made the fondant toppers. i made a few templates for the baseball jerseys and went on the internet for the logo and found the teammates names to match the favorite players numbers of the recipients of the cupcakes (thanks to a great link by my facebook group for the right website page a lot of time was saved). Anyway, I wanted to mix it up a bit and throw in something new, so I tried mini baseball mitts this time and I think they came out pretty cute for my first try. Hope the NY Yanks fan that I made these for like them-haven't heard feedback yet but since this is a repeat customer, I'm thinking they passed!

Here's some of the fondant toppers-I like to make them a day ahead so they dry and don't go all mushy wushy on the frosting they sit on (I borrowed my son's baseball to get the stitching as realistic as possible)

Here are a few of the mitts in the lower right hand corner, hard to see but if you squint....
Well, first things first. I mixed my dry ingredients (cocoa powder, flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt) together in a large bowl and whisked them to remove lumps and bumps.
Next, i added the wet ingredients starting with the 2 eggs one at a time.
Here is number two--hard to maneuver with one hand cracking and taking photo with other, lol
Next is the water, oil and vanilla.
Finally the buttercream goes in and then.....mix away thoroughly until all ingredients blend.
Line your pans with cupcake liners/baking cups and make sure oven is ready at 350 degrees..
Now you are ready to fill the cupcake cavities with 2/3 of the prepared cupcake batter.
Next, put them in the oven for approx. 18 minutes. I always set timer for 15 minutes and check how they are doing, usually adding on about 3-4 minutes.
Once they are baking, I start preparing the buttercream icing and piping bags. Here is some white buttercream frosting. I put blue gel in the bag to create a blue tint to the buttercream, trying to justify that there was no blue in the team jerseys, I tried this instead.
I use a large tall beer glass and place my piping bag in the glass, fold over the edges and scoop the frosting in the bag by the large dollop-full as you can see below:

Next, you see the unusual blue tinted frosting in the piping bag. I created some blue tinted, some red tinted and left several white. So, the palette for the NY Yankees cupcakes were red, white, blue and black.
Here are a few of the completed ones. Note the team jerseys, large baseballs, mini baseball bats/balls and mini baseball gloves plus some batting line-up signs. All in all, a sweet success and I think I knocked it out of the park somehow, despite the little hiccups along the way.

***Note to self: go buy some royal blue icing to have on hand for next order!!!!

PLAY BALL!!