Sock Monkey Love

As a food blogger, I was chosen by the marketing director of  Houghton Mifflin Harcourt to review their newest release by Karen Tack and Alan Richardson called Cupcakes, cookies and pie, oh, my!  You may remember their previous books What's new, Cupcake? and Hello, Cupcake!  You know, the cool and artistic way of decorating cupcakes to look like little works of art.  In this new addition Karen and Alan have stepped it up a notch adding  pies, cookies, brownies and Rice Crispy Treats to their repertoire.  Their simple techniques and tricks take you on a journey to getting creative in the kitchen using simple ingredients that you probably already have on hand.  Their ideas are ingenious, so simple, so clever that even a beginner baker can assemble these goodies with their eyes closed.  (Okay, so you can't really close your eyes.  You have to read the book and look at the amazing pictures and trust me, you'll want flip through it cover to cover.  It's that cute!)  So what are you waiting for?  Purchase the book HERE and get started today.

To start bake your favorite cupcakes and purchase a can each of vanilla and chocolate frosting.  

Purchase a cake board that is 9x13 or larger depending on the size of your project.  I chose to bake mini cupcakes because I needed 27 cupcakes for my daughter's 5th grade class.  Place the cupcakes as shown in the book (in my case, I added a few more) and use a flat cookie to fill in the bare spots as shown here.  I used gingersnaps.

Place vanilla on one side of a piping bag and Chocolate on the other.  It doesn't have to be perfect. They will touch, squish together and get messy. That's OKAY!!  It will still create the affect you are looking for.  Set that aside and fill another piping bag with just vanilla. You will use this first.

As I said before, I used more cupcakes then the book suggests so my guy's head shape is a bit different from the book.  Either way, start at the top and referring to the picture in the book, using a swirling motion, fill in all spots with white.

Then fill in the brown spots using the white and chocolate piping bag.  The cool two toned affect and swirls make it look very Sock Monkey-ish.  

Translation:  Knitted

Since tomorrow is Valentines Day I decided to make a red heart instead of the usual knitted scarf.  I used red fondant for this but you can use candy, frosting or fruit roll ups to embellish your little Monkey friend.  The sky  is the limit and your book will have a TON of ideas on what candy works best for all of their projects.

See how cute. I just want to squeeze him and hug him and cuddle him.  But, I can't.  It's food.  A cupcake. Frosting. Fondant.  It's not real.  Brace yourself...some of these projects looks So good that you shouldn't eat them.  

But you should. They are just as much fun to eat as they are to make.  Go for it.

Happy creating,