Decorate Your Cake and Eat It Too

Cupcakes, that is. The Park Central Greene County Library hosted a “How-To Decorate Cupcakes” course as part of their “How-To” class series, which they hold once a month. These are free classes that start at seven p.m. and are open to the public.  Friday, Feb 17, cupcake artist Lindsay Arnold showed fellow Springfield residents simple ways to dress up a yummy dessert.

Starting out, Ms. Arnold addressed the class, explaining everything from the proper way to fill a cupcake to what types of food coloring to use when baking and preparing frosting. (Gel food coloring, found at Hobby Lobby and Michaels.) She was also full of fun facts about these yummy treats. For instance, cupcakes do not need to be sweet. There are such things as a maple syrup bacon cupcake, as well as a white chocolate wasabi cupcake. Also, Arnold is an advocate of not baking from scratch. I must say, I agree with her. Why waste most of your time buying and prepping ingredients for something that is already prepared for the average consumer, plus, mixes mean less mess. Arnold also suggested using Martha Stewart's cupcake decorating ideas, but using mixes in place of Stewart’s made from scratch recipes.

Arnold went on to demonstrate to the class how to use a pastry bag to pipe icing on to a cupcake “just like milking a cow”. She proceeded to explain how to make simple decorations using things such as pre-prepared fondant decorations cut into fun shapes (snowflakes, stars, dinosaurs) colored on with food coloring pens. (No worries, these pens are kosher; it says so on the label.)

After about a 20 minute lecture on how to decorate cupcakes and the different ways to dress up flavors, using fruit preserves and extracts, Arnold left us with one piece of advice. “Practice, practice, practice, you’ll get it down.” Finally, the patrons of the class were allowed to decorate their own cupcakes.  This was the fun part. Everyone from small children to elderly ladies were up on stage piling buttercream icing onto their personal cakes. The smiles were endless as the crowd indulged themselves in the delectable sweetness of a beloved dessert. My favorite was the yellow cupcake with the strawberry buttercream icing, topped with sprinkles, of course. Let us eat cake!

This experience was fun, free and for all ages. I highly recommend looking into what else the Park Central Library has to offer.