Cupcake Decorating Class...

Last Friday I went on a cupcake decorating course with my friend and her Mum. I have had a go at piping once before at home, but have never used sugar paste to decorate cupcakes and this class taught us both. I had been looking forward to this since November and was very excited when the day finally came!
The course was run by the lovely Kirsty at Kirsty's Kitchen and I would recommend her classes because she made it very clear and easy to learn, it was a beautiful  location and a very enjoyable way to spend half a day.

All the cupcakes are ready prepared by Kirsty as we need the full 4 hours for decorating, but we were all given a copy of the recipe and tips for perfect cupcakes to take home with us. She can take a maximum of 13 students at a time but there were only 4 of us on this particular day.

We started by making a sheep cupcake using sugar paste. This was definitely the one I found the easiest even though I struggled a little making the ears.

I then went on to making these little fellas, (This was my favourite to make!)

Kirsty taught us how to mix sugar paste to make new colours and we needed this skill to make the grass for a bumble bee garden cupcake.

I made 2 of this design at the same time which makes it a lot quicker. The wings are made from rice paper and I think he has such an adorable face, don't you?

We had a break halfway through for afternoon tea and were treated to homemade Devon Splits, which are a sort of bready scone that are served with jam and cream. I may have a go at making these myself one day! They were really delicious and soft inside.

We soon got back to work though, now using a piping bag with strawberry butter icing and a fair bit of edible glitter. My first 2 attempts didn't work the way I had planned so I started again and was much happier with the end result. These are the prettiest cupcakes and would also make a good Valentine gift.

In total we each decorated 12 cakes to take home. It was an amazing experience and I hope that I will be able to do the course again sometime. Kirsty told us that every 3 months she changes the designs for decorating the cupcakes so that you can come again and maybe learn something else that's new! She also runs a breadmaking course, which is more expensive but is for a whole day.
It has definitely encouraged me to keep practising the new skills I have learned and maybe experiment a little.
Here is a last photo of all the finished cakes that I decorated myself.....just me....and actually I feel quite proud.......

This week we have Shrove Tuesday and Valentine's day on the calendar which no doubt will feature in my next post. See you soon!