Still e-book week plus Snow recipe

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A an ante-bellum romance set on Maryland's Eastern Shore involving plutocrats, pig iron, and the infamous murderess, Patty Cannon.

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7 to 10 Inches predictied today!

Yes, we know it is MARCH!

LET IT SNOW, CUPCAKES!

Ingredients
 
Makes 24 cupcakes (you can easily halve this recipe to make 12 cupcakes – just use up the rest of the cake mix by baking an 8×8 cake and halving the amounts of candy melts and chocolate)

• One box of white cake mix (to make your mix extra yummy, add an extra egg and replace the water needed with milk. For a vanilla mix, add a couple teaspoons of vanilla extract)
• 2 containers of white frosting (any flavor, as long as it is white!) We like almond
• Cupcake liners
• 2 bags cocoa candy melts (I used Wilton)
• 1 bag white candy melts or white chocolate
• Sparkling sugar (Wilton makes one that is available in many grocery stores)
• Granulated sugar
• Zipper bags
• Sheet protectors
• Pretzle sticks
• Tree clip art (I used this - the bare tree in the first row)

1. Print out a piece of paper with several copies of your tree. Insert the piece of paper into a sheet protector and grease it up, like this:

You can make smaller trees to fit more on one sheet!
2. Melt the brown candy melts according to the directions on the package. Place melted candy melts into a zipper bag and snip off one of the corners (you can use pastry bags, if you have them). All you have to do is pipe the candy using the picture as your guide.

The best part? The candy melts are totally forgiving.

In fact, the ridges and lines make it look even more tree-like! Use a toothpick for even more control, smoothing out areas or adding definition to others. You will be amazed at how realistic it turns out with very little effort! The only tricky part? The melts will begin to harden as you work, but you can re-melt the chocolate as needed (transfer to a heat-proof bowl for melting, then add back to the zipper bag).

3. Allow the trees to sit on the counter until firm to the touch, about 30-45 minutes. This is a good time to prepare and  bake your cupcakes, using the white cake mix.

4. Once the trees are “dry,” we are now going to add the snow onto the branches. Melt some white chocolate according to the package directions. Place chocolate in a zipper bag and snip off the tip (make a smaller hole for this than you did for the candy melts, since you want to be able to make smaller lines).

Pipe random line-y blobs onto the tree branches. Like this:
 
 
Now, while the white chocolate is still warm, douse the tree with sparkling sugar! (Once the trees are removed, you can roll up the sheet protector and pour the sprinkles back into the bottle to re-use).

Allow to dry completely, which should only take about 30 minutes.

5. Frost cooled cupcakes with white frosting. It doesn’t have to be perfect at all. Just use a butter knife to mound the icing onto the cupcake.

6. Mix some sparkling sugar and granulated sugar together into a small bowl (just eye-ball it, whatever looks like snow to you!) Dip the frosted cupcakes upside down into the sugar mixture, rolling around to coat.


If your frosting becomes lumpy, you will be able to re-shape it once it is covered in sugar – it won’t stick to your fingers!

7. Carefully remove the a chocolate tree from the sheet protector and attach a pretzel stick to the back with melted chocolate. Allow to cool until hard.  Insert the pretzel stick into the frosted cupcake.
The picture below shows a toothpick, but we tried that and it didn't work for us!

8. Repeat for all cupcakes.