Torviewtoronto: Making Cupcake Bouquets

I took a cupcake bouquet class at Le Dolci, as I was curious how cupcake bouquets are made. I found the experience fun, as the instructor explained us how to pipe three different flowers. She taught us how to make roses, carnation and daisies using the tear drop shaped tip. I have experience piping so I found it easy to follow the instructor, and had fun making these flowers.

After practicing for an hour on parchment paper, we got to decorate 12 mini-cupcakes that were pre-made for us. The buttercream icing was made with only butter and not shortening, so I found it was too quick to melt for my warm hands when I was piping :)

I like that the icing only had butter and not shortening. Here is the recipe for the butter cream icing from Le Dolci, which I am looking forward to make at home to decorate cakes and cupcakes.
1 cup butter

2 cups icing sugar

Use room temperature butter and whip it for 2 minutes. Add the icing sugar slowly.
It is optional to add a few drops of vanilla. For thinner consistency we can add water or milk a tsp at a time.

To make the cupcake bouquets, we need

bamboo skewers

clay pot

craft flower arranging foam*

knife and scissor

*found in the dollar store and craft shops

We cut up a piece of craft foam to fit into a clay pot so the cupcakes will have more balance when placed. The skewers were cut into 3 and placed in different heights. I pierced the cupcakes with a skewer lightly, but not all the way so it could be easily placed on the skewers.

I really liked how the bouquet looked after it was complete. I am glad that Le Dolci packs the goodies we make there to take home. My family thought it looked really pretty and enjoyed the bouquet of cupcakes.
I usually think icing is just for the looks and not encourage my children to have a lot on their cakes, so I removed most of the pretty icing before they enjoyed the cupcakes.

I think it is always better and fun to learn a skill by having hands on experience. Le Dolci offers many different classes so we can learn to make cake pops, croissant, macaroons, cookie decorating truffles and more. Check out their website to take a look at the upcoming classes.