Ariel Pull Apart Cupcake cake for Trinity's 4th birthday Recipe!

One year has past! Trinity has turned 4! I still remember when she requested for a "Princess Watalala cake" last year. She meant Cinderella. And she got it for her birthday. A fondant handmade Cinderella cake done by me. A first attempt. 

Of course by now, she can pronounce every Princess name accurately and she specially requested for an Ariel cake this year. 

Her school said that it would be better to have cupcakes like I made last year as it is easier to serve the children. So I decided to make an Ariel pull apart cupcake cake! This is my first attempt and I have to say that I'm pretty impressed with the final results!

This cake is requested, suggested, baked, partially assembled and partially Frosted by my 4 year old Trinity. She said she wanted to have pink and purple cupcakes with pink and purple frosting and Ariel on top with pink and purple candles. You get the girly drift. 

Yup so we did it! Here's the final results:

Tada! Trinity and all her girl friends at school were thrilled! 

The recipe is modified from Panya's Palette. 

(this

Recipe makes 12 standard cupcakes. I tripled the recipe to make 55 cupcakes.) 

Ingredients:

165g plain flour

1tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp vanilla essence

120g sugar

1 egg

80g veg oil

160g milk

Pinch of salt

1. Mix the sugar, salt, oil, milk, vanilla and egg together until sugar is dissolved.

2. Sieve in the flour, baking powder and baking soda  and whisk till smooth.

3.use a clean toothpick and pick up the amount of wilton gel food coloring you like. Add to batter and whisk till you get your desired color. 

4. Pour into a 7 inch round cake tin or cupcake cases and bake at 180C for 20-25mins.

5. Cool before decorating it. 

I made poodle balloon sculptures for the entire school, make about 50 of them. 

Trini adds the pink batter on top pf the purple batter. it is easy for children to work with batter using either a squeeze bottle or a piping bag. 

Tada! Fresh from the oven! 

Now to make: 

American Classic buttercream frosting

The original recipe uses lots of sugar ratio of butter to sugar is 1:3! It's too much for us to take so I cut it down by half and put it in the fridge before using so that it is firm without being too sweet. 

Ingredients:

(this recipe can frost 46 mini cupcakes)

2 cups unsalted butter (soften to ice cream like texture)

3 cups icing sugar, sifted

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

1 teaspoon sea salt 

2 tablespoon milk 

Stand by 2 cups Additional icing sugar to add 

1. Place soften butter in mixer. Use paddle attachment and beat till creamy.

2. Add icing sugar, vanilla extract and milk and continue beating till you get the desired consistency. Add more sugar if consistency is too soft and add more milk if consistency is too sift. 

This is my darling Tiffany who stayed up to make the frosting with me as she was waiting for me to nurse her. She is such a darling! I prepared the frosting one day in advance and thaw it 2  hours before using. You can leave the frosting in the refrigerator for a maximum of 1 week before use. 

Now to assemble the cake you need to cling wrap Ariel really well so that she doesn't get dirty and to make her tail and top, you need this amazing fruit roll ups which can be found at NTUC FINEST Woodgrove branch. You need about 3-5 pieces. It is easy to work with but the weather in Singapore makes it melt, tear and stick very easily so you do need  someone to hold Ariel for you while you wrap the fruit roll around. 

This is Ariel in Cling wrap and the "fruit roll ups" unrolled and how the packet looks like. 

Now assemble the cupcakes in any way you like and cut off the tops to make it even for frosting if needed 

This is the skeleton of the cake before slicing off the tops and before frosting.

To frost:

Use the buttercream and spread over the cupcake using an off set spatula and   Feel free to create the waves by moving your off set spatula in a circular motion. 

Pipe the borders in another color to give a better definition. 

I chilled the cake over night and worked with the rest of the details on the actual morning. It makes the buttercream firm up and easier to transport to the school. 

 For party favors, I made poodle balloon sculptures, About 50 of them and Trinity patiently drew eyes for every poodle! (almost! She gave up after doing about 40 pairs of poodles eyes at 10pm) 

hard at work! 

So we reached school and everyone was happy to have their Ariel cake and also the poodle balloon sculptures that Trinity gave out!

This is a great surprise for the children who are used to getting goodie bags. They got really excited and the teachers wrote their names on it to prevent conflicts.

After her teacher shared the timeline of her life for the past 4 years, she was invited to do the birthday walk to mark her turning of 4 years old. There were 2 other boys who had the same birthday month as her and they celebrated on the same day with their own cakes and goodie bags so you can imagine the joy on every child's face! 3 cakes to eat and 3 party favors to receive! 

As usual, the serious looking face when she is in the limelight...

Giving out balloons to everyone. 

Happy children makes all the effort worthwhile!

Trinity and Tiffany eats the birthday Cakes! 

Outdoor time!

Look at the strong Rambutan tree in Trinity's school! 

Tiffany looking for fallen rambutans.

 Tada! Mummy look! I found one! But it is time to go home! 

----------------------------------------

Praise Jesus for your strength to carry me through this 2 days of party preparation! Trinity and Tiffany enjoyed themselves tremendously!

Hope you will try this recipe for your child soon! If you have a son, I would suggest you to top with a car with an action figurine or transport with blue and green frosting! 

Inspiring Yummy Mummies

PoshPearl 

2 ingredients!!! Super easy and yummy Nutella cake!

Mother's day is near and your little ones or yourself would like to bake a cake for mother dearest but you may not want to invest a lot in baking ingredients as you hardly bake or you have ran out of ingredients and it's raining... What should you do? Fret not!
This 2 ingredients Nutella cake will save your day!
All you need is 240g of melted Nutella spread and 4 room temperature eggs!
It is that simple!
However the catch is you need to have a kitchen mixer because you need to whip the eggs till they TRIPLE in volume. So room temperature eggs helps to whip up the volume easier and melted nutella ensures easier mixing.
My 2 daughters Trinity and Tiffany enjoyed the process and I hope you and your little ones will enjoy it!
I have also made a YouTube video on it and I serve with vanilla ice cream and fresh berries. Click on the YouTube box on the right of my website (website view) to see the video!

The taste?
It doesn't have any nutella taste. It taste like a mud cake, like a rich chocolate cake. Fudgey in the middle and spongey on the outside. It has very good texture and taste which my family found it quite hard to believe that only nutella and eggs were used. The cake is not as sweet as eating nutella straight from the tub. And it is just nice in proportion. So go ahead! Give it a try!

Ingredients
240g melted nutella
4 room temperature eggs

Optional serving suggestion:
ice cream
Fresh berries

Necessary equipments n tools
Kitchen stand Mixer
Greased cake pan

1. Preheat your oven at 180 degree Celsius.
To melt nutella if you have not done so, place nutella in a heatproof bowl over boiling water and stir till melted. This method is known as a double boiler.
2. Crack the 4 eggs and whip over medium speed for 5-10 minutes until volume triples.
3. Fold in the whipped eggs 1/3 at a time until totally combined.
4. Pour the cake batter into the greased cake pan and drop it a few times to minimize the air bubbles.
5. Bake for 30 minutes or longer until a wooden skewer can be pierce through clean without any wet batter.
6. Cool down and remove from pan.
7. Serve with ice cream and fresh berries and surprise your mum this mother's day!

Inspiring Yummy Mummies
PoshPearl

My reflection on motherhood

Today marks the full year of me leaving full time lecturing for the Early Childhood department and my darling Tiffany will turn 1 in a couple of hours time! Here's my reflection written as follows in the pic :)

Parenting: independence

So proud of my Trinity! It's indescribable! I was nursing Tiffy when Trini finished her bottled milk.
I told her I can't help her to place her bottle in the kitchen sink but she can do it herself. I gave her instructions to place the bottle on the floor so that she can turn the door knob with two hands and she did. She even gently placed the bottle
far away from the door to prevent knocking the bottle down!
Then she went out of the room and came back with a grin so proud and satisfied.
And this is what I saw. My darling Trini's attempt to tiptoe and place the bottle into the sink.
Well done darling! Mummy is so proud of you! Thank you for being so understanding and independent!
At 3 years 1 month old.

It is definitely possible to nurture our
Children to be independent and Understanding. The first step is to BELIEVE that they are able to. Never underestimate children's
ability to learn. As long as you believe in them and empower them, they will not only be able to do it, they will exceed your expectations and
Surprise you!

Inspiring yummy mummies
PoshPearl

The dual birth stories of Trinity and Tiffany

Princess Tiffany arrived on
2nd March!!! It was an induced natural birth as I told my gynae, Dr Judy Wong of Thomson Medical Centre, that she hasn't been active the past couple of days so Dr Judy said, "go with the Mother's instincts." and had me induced. Thank God for that as when Tiffany was born, she had her umbilical cord around her neck and an arm! Thank God for His wisdom to guide Tiffany not to move much, as moving her arm would tighten the cord around her neck!

Praise Jesus She is safe and sound! At 38 weeks, she is 2.93kg, 47cm. while Trinity was 2.85kg, 48cm when she arrived at 37 weeks.

My birth story now... I didn't take epidural as I has very terrible side effects with Trinity. I was shaking like a drug addict and the epidural didn't take effect as I waited for 15 hours and was only dilated for 3cm and in the last few minutes after my gynae spoke to me about the possibility of C Sect, I suddenly dilated from 3cm to 9.5cm immediately which was so freaking pain!!! So the epidural numbed my body and made me shake uncontrollably but I could feel the actual dilation! Moreover, it made me feel physically weak and I couldn't do much for Trinity during her first month.
So this time round I decided not to have it. I wanted to experience the whole birth process. Boy was it a life changing experience! I thought I'd never made it through!
I was induced at 1.30pm. Contractions started and it was until 6pm when I thought it was bad. But I was only 3cm dilated then. At 7.30pm, the contractions were 30 seconds apart and it was so painful! I dilated to 5cm at 745pm and by 8pm I was fully dilated. I couldn't deal with with contractions and squeezed my hubby's thumb it was almost broken! It was so painful and I had the urge to push badly. It was a relief to be able to push actually! I had quite a bit of a tear because I was too eager to push and Dr Judy had to remind me to restraint myself (but Praise Jesus I recovered fast).
But I didn't regret not using epidural. I am so energetic and able to relief myself within 2 hours, bathe within 6 hours and walk around. I couldn't feel better! And I'm glad that I could actually feel Tiffany descending into the birth canal as I relaxed and appreciated how I could actually worked with Dr Judy and feel
Tiffany coming.
Breastfeeding has been awesome as well. Tiffany's rooting reflex is good and her suction power is very strong! I breastfed Trinity till she was 20 months old so will plan to breastfeed Tiffany as long as possible as well. However, this time round, Tiffany refuses to take the bottle. She would rather starve then to take the bottle and would only do direct latch on. However, Praise Jesus she has begun her weaning journey and she LOVES EATING as much as breastfeeding. :)

Inspiring Yummy mummies,