Catrin Day of the Dead Cupcake

catrin day of the dead cupcake

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Day of the Dead (Spanish: Día de los Muertos) is a Mexican holiday celebrated throughout Mexico and around the world in other cultures. The holiday focuses on gatherings of family and friends to pray for and remember friends and family members who have died. November 2nd is the official date for Day of the Dead, it is celebrated between October 31st and November 2nd.

In 2013 Day of the Dead celebrations begin November 1st and finish November 2nd. 

I've made a Cartrin this year, because a lady needs a dance partner. 

Made in the same way as the Catrina skull last year, you start with a white egg shaped piece of fondant or modelling paste.

Roll small sausage shapes and add to the skull to build up features. Use your finger tips and modelling tools to blend and shape the skull. Use a toothpick to mark out cracks and scratches on the skull.

Start the body with a torso shaped piece of fondant or puffed rice treat. If using puffed rice treat, cover with a base layer of fondant first. Cut a vest and apply with damp brush, I had imprinted the rolled fondant so I dusted with green lustre dust at this stage to bring out the pattern and add depth of colour. Small balls of fondant were marked with a toothpick and attached as the buttons.

Make white collar for the shirt, attach. Proceed to make the jacket, again attaching with a brush barely dampened with water.

Bow tie is made with two rectangles, the larger one is pinched in the middle and shaped. The smaller one is wrapped around the center of the large one.

Make pocket handkerchiefs with small triangles, attach to jacket and then attach false pocket flap to the top.

For the hat I used puffed rice treat to reduce the weight, I know he is a skeleton and all but I didn't want to squoosh his head. Squeeze and shape the puffed rice treat into a top hat, cover with fondant. Make a band and brim with fondant.

For the buttonaire see Catrina Cupcake  

Leave the pieces to dry, supported where necessary to keep the shapes. Once dry use dusts to shade the piece and insert either a strand of dry spaghetti or a small wooden through the whole piece and attach to your cupcake.

Happy Baking :)  

Amazon has a range of day of the dead figures... click on the Senorita to visit Amazon :) 

You might also be interested in a recipe for quick and easy Chocolate Peanut Spiders for the kids and young at heart.

Day Of The Dead Catrina Cupcake

day of the dead catrina cupcake

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Day of the Dead (Spanish: Día de los Muertos) is a Mexican holiday celebrated throughout Mexico and around the world in other cultures. The holiday focuses on gatherings of family and friends to pray for and remember friends and family members who have died.

wikipedia

La Calavera Catrina ('The Elegant Skull') 1910 zinc etching by Mexican printmaker José Guadalupe Posada.

Popularized by José Guadalupe Posada, Catrina is the skeleton of an upper class woman, and one of the most popular figures of the Day of the Dead celebrations, which occur during two days, November 1 and November 2.

Ha, I love the day of the dead celebration; it's fun, macabre and makes for a fabulous themed event.

Whether you want to make a Catrina or the simpler skull cupcake picks at the end of today's post, throw a day of the dead party this year!

starting the skull

Catrina starts with a basic white fondant skull shape. Features for the skull are indented and surrounds built up with modelling paste. You can see I've marked out where the mouth will be and a hole was added to the bottom for a toothpick. Once dry, lustre, petal dust and edible food marker added shadows and features to the piece. The hat itself is a round of thinly rolled modelling paste with a shell tool used to mark the edges. 

Scruffy flowers were made with coloured modelling paste. Small pieces of each colour were rolled thinly and the edges were either pulled out with a small ball tool or cut into a fringe with a craft knife. From there they were rolled up and the excess pinched off the end to form a flower. 

Finished flowers are very small and if you are thinking this all sounds a bit fiddly perhaps day of dead mini fondant toppers are what you are after. 

Mini Day of the Dead fondant cupcake picks are super cute, easy enough for the kids to make and look fabulous topping a display of mini cupcakes. 

Mini Day of the Dead fondant cupcake picks 

basic white fondant skull shapes

Form a basic skull shape from white fondant, use a toothpick to pierce a hole in the bottom of the skulls.

Let your skull shapes dry for a few hours (or overnight) and then using edible food markers, edible glitter and lustre duster to decorate your pieces. Insert half toothpicks that have been coloured with food colouring into the skulls and top your mini cupcakes.

Happy Baking :) 

Looking for Catrina and Day of the Dead figures? SilverCrow has a range of traditional and not so traditional Day of the Dead pieces. Search 'Day of the Dead' once there.

one of the many day of dead figures available from SilverCrow

Or perhaps a Catrina pill/mint box?   

you might also be interested in gothic horror cupcakes 

Scary Dollies and Bat Candles

                                          scary dollies cupcakes

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Yesterday my step son Daniel tried to tell my husband and I that a spider was trying to enter his car to "kill him"... I say "tried to tell" because we were laughing so hard once he mentioned the spider had murderous intentions we didn't hear the rest of the story. 

For Dan, spiders are the ultimate in "creepiness"; for me it's dollies... dollies with eyes that open and close. 

Near death to dead from fright?? I was seven years old and literally dying from post surgery complications. The powers to be (namely my parents) had a secret surprise for me they told me to rest and everyone left the room, including the last rights priest. I was laying in my hospital bed when a giant blinking eyed doll popped up beside me, when it spoke I started screaming. And, I screamed and screamed and screamed!! 

I was lucky enough (so I was told!!) to be have visited by the famous Australian ventriloquist Ron Blaskett and his doll 'Gerry Gee'. 

Gerry Gee and Ron Blaskett

Today's blog post is super easy "ideas" for Halloween treats, let them be a springboard for your creations.

Simple cupcakes baked in Halloween cases are spread with frosting, sprinkled with crushed cookie crumbs then topped with moving eye baby dolls. I cut the heads off some of the dolls, melted bits, pulled off limbs to make my scary doll cupcakes. 

Baby dolls from SilverCrow Creations (US)

                                         Happy Halloween Cupcake

A resin skull treat box (I got these a few years ago) holds lollies and then is topped with a simple frosted cupcake, edible glitter and bat candle. The cake is attached with a dab of melted chocolate.

skull treat box

I coloured the toothpick on the bat toothpick candles with food colour to match the theme.

Bat candles by Ramona Ramona, I got mine from Little Betsy Baker (AU). 

Happy baking :)