Drivin' Down the Road Cupcakes and Smash Cake

Great way to use a number 1 cookie cutter: Gently press the cookie cutter into the frosting and carefully remove it. This will leave the outline of the number 1 and then you can pipe frosting inside the outline. 

Tip - Pipe the number onto the cake first. Then decorate the top of the cake from the center to the edges.

The Road: Pipe four strips of dark gray frosting, side by side, across the cupcake with a #47 basket weave tip with the smooth side up.

The Grass: Use a #67 leaf tip to form the grass on the cupcakes and the smash cake. Hold the pastry bag so that the long slots of the leaf tip are vertical. Pipe and lift to form the grass.

The Road Border and Stripes: Pipe white frosting along the edges of the gray frosting and down the center of the road with a #5 piping tip. 

I used a small, stainless steel pan to make this 5.5 to 6 inch smash cake. 

Decorating the Cake Top

• Gently press the brim of a large glass into the frosted center of the cake top. This will give you a perfect circle for your track center and road. 
• Fill in the center with a #67 leaf tip and follow the directions above. 
• Then pipe the road around the circular edge of the grass with a #47 basket weave tip with the smooth side up. 
• Having your cake on a lazy susan with greatly help with this part of the decorating. Turn the lazy susan as you pipe around the grass edge.
•  As with the cupcakes, pipe four side by side strips of dark gray frosting to form the road. 

Candy Bar Car Cupcake and Cake Toppers

• $3 bag of mini-candy bars - about 27 bars
• 1 large bag of candy coated chocolate candy - I used about half of the candy. 
• 1 box of teddy bear graham crackers
• small amount of semi-sweet chocolate chips. 
• 1 small pastry bag

Chocolate Candy Glue

I placed about  2 Tbsp. of semi-sweet chocolate chips into a pastry bag and microwaved them at 20 second intervals until they were soft and melted. Then I snipped the very end off the pastry bag. This was my "glue" to hold the candy wheels, steering wheel, and bear halves onto the candy bars. 

I have included the video that I watched before making my teddy bear candy cars.

In the video, it shows cutting the steering wheel candy piece in half and piping on headlights. As you can see, I didn't do this and am perfectly happy with the end results!

For video directions        Click Here

Basic Butter Cream Frosting

This is my favorite butter cream frosting and it will frost 2 dozen cupcakes or 1 - 8 inch cake. For 3 dozen cupcakes and the smash cake I made 2 double batches of frosting and had plenty of frosting for the 6 inch smash cake. The smash cake was cut in half and filled with frosting.

Ingredients

• 4 Tbsp of salted butter, at room temperature
• 1/2 cup of vegetable shortening Do not use pre-creamed shortening.
• 1/2 tsp. of vanilla or other extract
• 1/4 cup of water
• 1 lb. of confectioners sugar

Directions

• Place butter and shortening in a mixing bowl.
• Beat on low speed for 2-3 minutes
• Add half of the powdered sugar and extract
• Beat on low speed until the sugar is almost blended with the butter-shortening mixture
• Add the remaining powdered sugar and the water.
• Beat at low speed for 2-3 minutes, scraping sides of bowl once or twice. 

You will need to divide and tint your frosting the colors you want.