Sunday, July 1, 2012

Baking for the Bug Man book

My book club is coming over tomorrow night to discuss Tim Downs' book, FIRST THE DEAD, a book featuring "the bug man," or a forensic entomologist.  If you're not familiar with the term, it's a man who specializes in determining how long people have been dead by the bugs found, er, on and in the body.

Enough of that.  Anyway, I always try to bake something that ties in with the book either directly or indirectly.  And, because I spent part of the afternoon at the SPCA, I didn't have a lot of time to come up with something.

So I looked in one of my cupcake books (HELLO, CUPCAKE) and found a picture of some ants,  And since to my way of thinking ants = bugs, that's what I decided to do.  Easy and cute.

Frost the cupcakes with green frosting
What I needed:
cake mix
chocolate covered almonds
vanilla frosting
food coloring
dark chocolate frosting
baking tools (piping bags and tips)

First thing:  bake some cupcakes in green cupcake liners.  Because time was of the essence, I used a mix.

Second, mix some green and yellow food coloring into canned vanilla frosting.  I also bought a can of dark chocolate frosting for decoration.

closeup of the "grass" tip
When the cupcakes had cooled, I frosted them with the green color, then used the "grass tip" to put a little "grass" around the edges.  The frosting wasn't stiff enough to really hold the points, but from a distance it looks okay.

Then I simply placed three chocolate-covered almonds on each cupcake, then I used the dark chocolate to pipe legs and eyes on each ant.  The entire effect, I think, is cute, and it wasn't difficult at all.

You could, of course, line them up on your table if you wanted to cover it in a red and white checked table cloth, but our book didn't deal with a picnic theme . . . and rather than follow our book's theme exactly, I think I'll simply present the ants on a platter.

Enjoy your baking!



Three almonds on each

Pipe a little grass around the edges 

Pipe on the legs with chocolate frosting. Don't forget the little eyes. Done! 
~~Angie