Delectably Mine

After Day 1 of making wedding cupcakes I was super excited to start on day two. Frosting and decorating cupcakes is the most fun part of the whole process. Taking a squat little cake and covering it in a beautiful layer of buttery, sugary goodness and adding a few decorative touches to finish them off makes me smile. They can be so beautiful. As day two dawned, I was ready to go!

The whole day turned out beautifully, the weather was perfect, the ceremony was lovely, and the reception was fun and enjoyable, an all around good time. And of course, one of the highlights of the night was dessert! :)

The finished product, at the reception

On the day of the wedding, I was alone in the house for a few hours, and my morning consisted of making something like 10 batches of frosting (this is a time when an industrial sized mixer would have come in quite handy). That was really the time consuming part. Once that was out of the way it was a cinch to fill the pastry bags and pipe the frosting on the top of the cupcakes. By that time Lara was back and we flew through the decorating. It is always so exciting to see the finished product, especially when they turn out just as well as you imagined.

Lots and lots of frosting!

Piping it all on

We made it to the reception in one piece, all of the cupcakes intact, no big accidents thank goodness. Whoever was in charge of the dessert tables had done a beautiful job laying out platters and stands for the cupcakes. Hanging up behind the sweets were the wedding dresses from all four of my cousin's grandmas along with photos of those four brides in their wedding dresses. The dresses hung down onto the table creating a beautiful tablecloth of sorts. The whole display was gorgeous, the perfect back drop for the cupcakes.

Another shot of the beautiful table

The Cupcakes

Cherry Limeade Cupcakes

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Cupcakes

Classic White Cupcakes

A cute sign Lara made to help people

with their difficult dessert decision

Just some more pictures of the table

Yum!

It all looked so pretty

There was also a candy table

This beautiful bride (with a reflection right on

her face, sorry) is my grandma

Just a couple more pretty pictures

So fun and pretty

The cupcake bakers with the bride at the end of the night, what a wonderful time we all had!

The whole process was fun and pretty much went without a hitch. We managed to do it all in just two rather full days of baking and decorating. It took a lot of time, but was still very doable. I managed to jot down a few things that I learned through this whole thing:

Have double the number of pans that you are going to bake together. For example, we baked 30 cupcakes at a time, so it was great that we had enough pans so that we could get another batch of 30 filled and ready for the oven while the first batch baked. This cut down on the time a lot.

Have two bowls for your stand mixer. This way you can have a clean on ready to go if you need it and don't have to waste time washing the same one over and over. We actually had two Kitchen Aid mixers, but found that while it wasn't really necessary to have two mixers, having the two bowls was a big help.

You really need a stand mixer. While it would be physically possible to make this many cupcakes without a stand mixer, I wouldn't try it. It would take forever and be a mess.

Make sure you have something to store and carry your cupcakes in. I ordered some plastic cupcake holders online that were not that expensive and they were worth it. I didn't have to worry about how to transport them without falling over, or where to store them until they were needed. And, when the night is over, you don't have to worry about getting all of you own plastic containers back, you can just throw them away.

Last week, my family and I got to celebrate the marriage of my cousin Bailey. It was a gorgeous outdoor wedding with perfect weather, an all around wonderful day. What made this wedding extra exciting for me though was the fact that Lara and I were in charge of making all of the cupcakes for the reception. It all started shortly after Bailey got engaged. She approached us with the idea of making a couple different kinds of cupcakes to serve at the reception. Of course Lara and I jumped at the opportunity. The three of us often get together to do some baking and hang out, so it was fun to be able to bake for her on such a large scale on her special day. In this post and the next I'll share some pictures, thoughts, and ideas about baking cupcakes for a wedding, or any other large group.

240 of the 274 cupcakes we ended up making, waiting for the big day

Bailey decided that she wanted three different kinds of cupcakes at her wedding. Two of them we had made together previously and had loved, so it was a no brainer to use them for her wedding. In addition she wanted just a plain white cupcake too, something simple and familiar. With that all figured out the cupcake menu was as follows:

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Cupcakes
Cherry Limeade Cupcakes
Classic White Cupcakes

It was a good mix of flavors, a little something for everybody. Bailey's wedding colors were coral and green, so the light pink frosting of the cherry limeade cupcakes and the light green we decided to color the frosting of the white cupcakes were a beautiful and fitting way to finish off the meal.

This was by far the most cupcakes I have ever made at one time. Last fall Lara and I made around 120 cupcakes for some friends, but this was over double that. Since the wedding was on Friday afternoon, we decided to bake all of the cupcakes on Thursday, and make the frosting and frost the cupcakes on Friday morning. It was a lot of baking and frosting in two days, but it all went really well. I would definitely do it in two days again if I am able. We thought about making the cupcakes ahead and freezing them, but since we had the time to do it all the day before, we thought that would be the better option. Fresh cake is always the best!