Inspiration: Darkness!

When asked to make cupcakes for an NYC Halloween cocktail party I was beyond excited.  I envisioned adorable cupcakes with pumpkin, ghost, and witch decorations balanced atop swirls of frosting.  But before I could share my festive ideas, the client informed me that they were hosting a dark, creepy, and gory Halloween Bash.  Hmmmm.....as the girl who used to wear a flower in her hair everyday and is distracted by sparkly and colorful objects, this project was going to stray far from my usual designs.  I shook myself free of my familiar bright and cheery inspiration and focused on something new.  This time, my inspiration would be DARKNESS!!!

To start, I baked dark chocolate and bloody red velvet cupcakes to set the tone. The Cemetery is an iconic image of Halloween; rows of tombstones conjure up sad, dark, and gloomy thoughts...perfect for this event!  I made tiny tombstones out of black fondant and wrote R.I.P in a runny red royal icing to look like it was written in blood. The tombstones are rising out of dark chocolate cream cheese frosting with gloomy Oreo dirt.

I wanted to include some classy gore into the cupcakes for this cocktail hour affair. Since vampires are far too overdone, I decided bloody shards of glass would add a beautifully gruesome touch of gore to the display. I created the shards of glass from a clear caramel. To create the blood I mixed food coloring with piping gel and dipped the caramel pieces in the 'blood' before viciously stabbing them into the cream cheese frosting.

The inspiration for the final cupcake came from a very dear college friend of mine. She has an incredibly dark sense of humor and LOVES the creepy Tim Burton classic, 'The Nightmare Before Christmas.' The hollow-eyed, stitched up face of Jack was the perfect gloomy touch to my dark and dreary cupcakes.

In addition to cupcakes I made spidery red velvet and chocolate Halloween whoopies

As well as some yummy sugar cookie candy corn to add (just a touch) of brightness!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN to all and hope everyone has a horribly dark, gloomy, (and Sweet!) Halloween weekend!