Some 5 or 6 years ago, Michael my husband finished his degree. To celebrate we bought at the local grocery store, a cute little pile of cupcakes that were all pushed together and frosted as one as if it were a sheet cake. The shape was that of a graduation hat. The frosting was very thick, and very solid and very very blue! So blue that the next morning the blue had travelled right through everyone...o.k. TMI, but for several reasons the cake was apparently quite memorable, especially to Meghan.
When her high school graduation rolled around last week, I was so tired that I was resolved to just "buy" a cake (gasp! I know) rather than try to make one admidst all that we had to do. There was prom, baccalaureate mass and awards ceremonies, end of the year finals craziness, baseball Allstars, birthdays and on and on so I contacted the grocery store where we bought it before, planning to just give in and get it there. But alas while they had some cute cake designs, none were quite what Meghan wanted. I really didn't want to just settle for "o.k." and contemplated how hard, really, it would be for me to try to tackle this teeny tiny project too.
So I looked around the internet and found a few ideas that I turned into the cupcake cake for Meg's graduation. Since her school colors (and the party theme) was red and gold, I decided to use those colors on the cake. The only thing is that red is not a good cake frosting color. Yes, the gel colors they make these days are far better than they used to be, but I didn't have any, and no matter how hard I try with the older food coloring, I can never ever get a true red out of anything. It always looks like a washed out, sorta red, or a dark reddish pink. So I focused on the "gold" which of course was at best a yellow but easier to read the writing on yellow.
One of the tricks to this cake (that I did better on Mary Ellen's Frozen cake the next day) was to make sure the frosting (my usual buttercream) was really thick and actually colder than usual. As I frosted this cake, I found that the meltier version of the buttercream which I made with heavily whipped whipping cream, actually started to seep down through the "holes" in between the cupcakes. Fortunately I was able to refill the growing depressions with more frosting and get it all in the fridge to solidify and saved it. In Mary Ellen's Frozen cake, I used only a small amount of milk and more powdered sugar and while the frosting was heavier, it worked better overall.
I wasn't that happy with the shape of the bottom part of the graduation cap. I have seen it sort of scalloped edged or straight, and went with the straight, but wasn't quite pleased. . It looks rather cartoonish to me but that's what I chose, and so it was! I had a couple of extra cupcakes and figured I would add the school's initials and a "2015".
The neat thing about these cakes is how easy it was to serve them. Basically the kids could just pull the cupcakes out one by one and we didn't need forks or plates or a cutting knife. :-)The procedure for both cakes was basically the same.
I baked the white cake cupcakes in colored papers I had to match the theme. After they were cooled, I put them on the cake board with a dab of frosting on each bottom to hold it to the board--at least the outer edge ones, and put them in the shape I wanted and that fit the board. I made sure I really pushed them together tightly to avoid frosting seepage in the holes. I also tried to make sure before I baked them, when filling my cups, that they were all about the same height. A few times some cupcakes were too low in the middle and too high on the edges so I merely moved the high ones inside and the low ones onto the edge and that helped level it out.
I tinted my usual buttercream (although modified so it was denser than I usually make) and put it into my piping bag with the large cupcake frosting tip. I then went around all of the edges to make the first attempt at binding it together.
I used ready made vanilla frosting in a piping bag with the larger writing tip to create my outline of Olaf and then filled in the outline with the vanilla, spreading it with my small rubber spatula to get it smooth. I also cheated by using my Wilton aerosol can of "Ready to Decorate" Icing in black which I used for Olaf's buttons, eyes and mouth. At one point I made a boo boo, (since the icing comes out rather abruptly from the can) so I put the entire thing in the fridge again (would have done the freezer if I had room) until it hardened somewhat. I then removed the boo boo with a toothpick, very carefully, applied a little more white frosting over the remnant of the booboo and then did it again. It fixed it just fine.
I had some leftover red (aka reddish) frosting from the Graduation Cap cake and used it for the red/pinkish nose of Olaf, and then mixed in some brown gel color with the rest of it to make his woodsy colored arms at the end.
Finally, I had some candy snowflakes that Kathleen gave me that came in her "party kit" that I added to the top near Olaf's head to make it look like snow. I also put a few on the extra cupcakes I had.
I tucked the extra cupcakes around it (though I actually liked the look of the cake without the cupcakes--seemed to make it look cluttered.) I didn't think this cake was suited for writing on, so I didn't put "Happy Birthday Mary Ellen." I hope she didn't notice.! :-)
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