Happy Birthday Farhene & Naurene!

So today I found myself baking 72 cupcakes for my twin sisters' 9th birthday. I love baking them cupcakes (Funfetti is their favorite), but my head hurt thinking about decorating and taking all those cupcakes to their school tomorrow for their respective birthday parties. Frosting is really a pain, as well as packing frosted cupcakes correctly to prevent them from getting smushed. So here's a fool-proof way to make birthday cupcakes that kids like, sans frosting- that still look and taste just as good! And the best part is, you can just throw them on top of each other in a container.

M&M Cupcakes

If you have the time to bake your cupcakes from scratch, you can do so, but I went for Pillsbury mixes in both Funfetti and Devil's Food flavors. If you want your cupcakes to taste like a chocolate chip cake, go for the Funfetti. If you want them to taste more like a rich brownie, go for the (Moist) Devil's Food.

-1 box of cupcake mix (or your own batter)

-Ingredients for the mix (this varies based on the brand, may include eggs, vegetable oil, etc.)

-1 bag of M&M's candies (12.6oz) OR Hershey's Kissables

-Cupcake cups for lining

Prepare the batter; pour into the cups. Place as many M&M's as you want into each cup (I used 10!) and lightly cover the candies with the batter. The Kissables are larger, so if you use those instead you can place less of them in the batter. Don't push them in as they will naturally fall during baking, and you don't want them all at the bottom.

Bake as directed. After you remove the cupcakes, you can choose how to decorate them. I used the leftover M&M's to create "cupcake faces." If you will decorate with the leftover M&M's or Kissables, push them into the cupcakes while they are fresh out of the oven and the cake will yield to the candies.

This makes two dozen cupcakes- just buy an additional bag of candy for each additional box of mix you bake. Since I had a large, flat aluminum tray for transporting, I cheated and added a blue frosting "smile" to the M&M eyes and nose.

I know it's really simple, and nothing that's never been done before- but I hope this idea helps if you ever have to bake a LOT of cupcakes to take to an event! I'm a huge fan of throwing in chocolate chips whenever I bake brownies, but I was still surprised at how yummy of a frosting substitute the melted M&M's were :) An added plus- the twins had so much fun helping (and eating most of the ingredients before I could use them).

<3