Dr. Seuss Cupcakes

It's Dr. Seuss' birthday on March 2nd. I heard that Lakeshore Learning was doing a Dr. Seuss birthday party with crafts and storytime for the kids, and I got into the Dr. Seuss spirit and wanted to try to make some cupcakes inspired by this great author and have some friends over before heading down to Lakeshore Learning for the crafts.

I knew I wanted some of them to be with green eggs and ham. That was my favorite Dr. Seuss book growing up. I couldn't think how to make the ham. Then it came to me--cake balls. I actually have never made them before, but have wanted to try them out. Super easy. Just bake a cake in a 9x13 pan, let it cool, then crumble it up, and mix a tub of icing in with it. Now comes the fun (and somewhat messy part)--roll the mixture into balls, or whatever shape you need (mine are cute little hams). Place on a parchment lined cookie sheet and refrigerate for several hours.

Then take candy melts in whatever color you choose (I of course picked green). Melt them in a microwave on 20 second intervals, stirring inbetween. Then have fun dipping. A spoon with a toothpick to help push the balls off the spoon worked just great for me. Once it is dry you can take a knife and trim the excess chocolate off the cake balls. That is your basic cake ball.

Now here is where I started to have some creative fun--a dot of white candy melts in the center for the bone.

and some painted lines to give it the Seussified ham effect. (I used some brown food coloring paste mixed with a little clear vanilla--the Food Writers that Wilton puts out didn't seem to write at all on the chocolate candy melts)

Just frost some cupcakes in chocolate and add a couple of eggs made from blobs of melted white and green candy melts, and voila--Green Eggs and Ham

The Cat in the Hat cupcakes were super easy. I found this idea on line. First you need some kind of red, round candy. Red lifesavers work great, but I opted for the red cinnamon discs from Walmart. They were perfect for the hat.

I just layered them with blobs of vanilla icing to get these cute little hats.

I definitely would eat these in a box, and I would eat them with a fox. I would eat them here or there. I would eat them everywhere! How about you?

Why stop there? I needed an excuse to purchase a bag of my favorite candy--swedish fish. (I have been craving them for a couple of weeks and needed a definite sugar fix). Why not include them in my set up--you know, incorporate the "One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish" theme. No blue fish to be found, but I'm fine with just red.

And I just had to throw in a hidden Mickey on one of the cupcakes. Call it my signature statement (that I'm kind of just starting, so maybe I can't call it a "signature statement" quite yet). Hopefully Walt Disney and Dr. Seuss liked each other, or they may not have been too happy with my incorporation of their two worlds.

Thank you for having a birthday, Dr. Seuss. It gave me a good excuse to be creative this weekend. It is such a destresser for me.