Orange Pumpkin Halloween Cupcakes

One of my friends loves to bake, so she decided that we were going to make Halloween cupcakes this weekend!! So last night we invited everyone over to the kitchen and made it a group project. They turned out so good! Everyone really enjoyed them. ;)


Lauren is wondering what exactly she's supposed to do with that stuff...lol. She couldn't figure out how much 1/4 of a cup was...so Becca just handed her a 1/4 measuring cup to put the batter into the backing cups..haha...guess she doesn't do this very often does she?


Becca, our head chef, creating the mix. :)



1 package yellow or white cake mix
1 cup solid pack pumpkin
3/4 cup water
3 eggs
2 tbs veggie oil
1 tsp ground cinnamon and pumpkin pie spice
orange food coloring
icing
8 oz cream cheese
1/2 cup butter
2 cups powdered sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
optional- black gumdrops to put on top

recipe: preheat oven to 350F line 24 standard muffin cups w/ paper baking cups
beat cake mix, pumpkin, water, eggs, oil, cinnamon, and pumpkin pie spice in large bowl w/electric mixer at medium speed 3 minutes or until well blended. spoon 1/4 cup batter into each muffin cup

bake about 20 min. or until toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. cool cupcakes in pans 10min. remove to wire racks; cool completely

icing: cream butter and cream cheese till creamy,mix vanilla, gradually stir in powdered sugar. store in fridge

and then if you want to use the chocolate then you place 4 squares of semi sweet chocolate in a plastic resealable sandwich bag and microwave on medium 40 seconds

knead bag; microwave 30 seconds to 1 minute or until chocolate is melted. knead bag till chocolate is smooth. cut off tiny corner of bag. Drizzle chocolate in four or five concentric circles over top of cupcakes. Immediately draw 6 or 8 lines at regular intervals from center to edges of cupcakes w/ toothpick or knife to create web

for spiders, place one gumdrop in center of web design on top of cupcake. Roll out another gumdrop w/ rolling pin on generously sugared surface. Slice thinly and roll into "legs." Arrange legs around gumdrop to complete spiders