With temperatures rising and schools letting out, we thought that it would be the perfect time to make some cupcakes that reflected the centerpiece of every summer event – the grill! These decadent chocolate cupcakes are perfect for Father’s Day, a backyard barbecue, or even just a lazy summer afternoon when you don’t feel like leaving your cool house!
For the cupcake we used our go-to Devil’s Food Cake (recipe at the end of this post!) that we also used for our Crab Cake Cupcakes. You could really use any cake flavor that you wanted, we just went with Devil’s Food Cake because 1) this is the best cake recipe EVER and we love making it and 2) the brown color goes with the grill theme!
We decided to go with a chocolate buttercream (recipe at the end of this post) to again keep with the grill theme and because let’s be honest, you can really never go wrong with chocolate topped with chocolate.
After baking and frosting the cupcakes, we mixed red and yellow sugar in a small dish and sprinkled them over the cupcakes to look like the burning coals of a charcoal grill. *Side note – it took trips to one Target and two different Walmarts to find red and yellow sprinkles, because someone decided to take ALL of the sprinkles from EVERY place we looked. Be wary of sprinkle thieves in your area.
We then added grill lines to the top of each cupcake using black icing gel. Now for the fun part- adding hot dogs and kabobs to our grills! To make the kabobs, we cut up gummy bears into three pieces using a sharp paring knife, and then slid 6 pieces onto a whole toothpick. So easy to make and they really do look like little kabobs with all the different colors! To make the hot dogs, we used Hot Tamales candy. For the “grill marks”, we dipped a toothpick into the black icing gel and drew three slanted stripes on each candy.
We added one kabob and two hot dogs to each grill and voila! Our cupcakes were grilled to perfection!
“Grilled to Perfection” Cupcakes
Devil’s food cake (from THE CAKE BLOG)
1 box Devils Food Cake Mix
1 small box (3.9oz) Chocolate Instant Pudding
1 cup vegetable oil
3/4 cup milk
4 eggs
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line muffin pans with cupcake liners.
- In medium bowl combine cake mix, chocolate pudding, vegetable oil, milk and eggs.
- Beat with electric mixer until incorporated and then continue mixing 1-2 minutes.
- Bake for 20-22 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.
- Let cupcakes cool in pans for 5 minutes, then remove to wire racks to finish cooling.
Chocolate Buttercream Frosting (From I HEART EATING)
- With an electric mixer (either hand or stand), beat butter until pale, about 3-4 minutes on medium.
- Scrape down the bowl.
- Add 3½ cups powdered sugar, cocoa powder, vanilla, and 2 tablespoons of milk.
- Mix on low until powdered sugar and cocoa powder are incorporated.
- If the frosting is too dry, add another tablespoon of milk. If the frosting is too wet, add powdered sugar 2 tablespoons at a time until it reaches a spreadable consistency.
For the decorations
- at least 3 tubes of Wilton Black Icing Gel (if you want to decorate all 24 cupcakes)
- 1 box of Hot Tamales candy
- 1 bag of Haribo gummy bears
- toothpicks
- yellow and red (or orange) sugar sprinkles
We hope you have as much fun making these cute grill cupcakes as much as we did! Make sure to follow us on Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest (@theswirlblog, links on the top bar) for our latest updates!
