Panda cupcakes are a thing and they’re even cuter than you think!
If you’re looking for the perfect treat to take your kids’ school function, birthday party, a potluck, summer barbecue, or just to enjoy yourself — these adorable little cupcakes are just what the doctor ordered.
Why settle for boring regular cupcakes when you can turn them into cute little panda faces? Got that extra mile, your kids will thank you!
Taking your cupcakes from plain to panda-tastic is actually really easy too and only takes an extra minute or so!
And it’s totally worth it … I mean, COME ON! How cute are these?!
For this recipe, courtesy of Bakerella, you’re going to need:
For the chocolate cupcakes:
– 1 1/2 cups of flour
– 2/3 cup of cocoa
– 1 1/3 cups of sugar
– 1 teaspoon of baking soda
– 1/2 teaspoon of baking powder
– 1/2 teaspoon of salt
– 2 eggs
– 1/3 cup of oil
– 1 teaspoon of vanilla
– 2/3 cup of milk
– 2/3 cup of hot water
For the panda decorations you’ll need:
– Frosting of your choice
– Decorator bag (or a Ziploc bag with an end cut off) and Ateco tip 807
– White sanding sugar
– Chocolate chips (she used Ghiradelli dark chocolate chips because they’re a good size for these mini cupcakes)
– Jimmies, chocolate or black (these are optional but are needed if you want to give your panda faces a mouth)
– Pastel confetti sprinkles, just white ones for the eyes
– Black edible ink pen
Now it’s time to get cooking! Start off by baking the cupcakes, which are mini. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Fill a mini cupcake tin with liners.
In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the dry ingredients. Then, add eggs, oil, vanilla and milk and mix together until all the ingredients are well incorporated. Add in the hot water and keep mixing.
Fill each cupcake liner about 3/4 full with the batter and bake for 15 minutes. Allow them to cool and then it’s time for the fun part — decorating.
After your mini cupcakes have cooled frost them using the frosting, decorator bag (or Ziploc bag) and Ateco tip #807.
Bakerella instructs us to pipe a small amount of frosting on top. You don’t need to cover the cupcake completely because you’ll be pressing it into a bowl of sanding sugar. By pressing it into the sugar, it’ll cause most of the frosting to spread out and cover the whole top.
Then it’s time to start making the panda faces! For the nose, place a chocolate chip towards the bottom and sideways.
Plant two chocolate chips pointy side down for the eyes and two on the perimeter flat side up for the ears, like so.
Then, this is where those optional chocolate jimmies come into play. If you want to add a mouth they’re just the guys for the job.
Now all you need is eyes and your adorable little panda faces are complete! Take the white confetti sprinkles and attach them to the chocolate chip eyes. Use a little bit of frosting to keep them in place. Then, take that black edible ink pen and draw on pupils.
And there ya have it! Your panda cupcakes are complete!
You can play around with different eye, nose and mouth variations for each cupcake if you’d like. These cute mini cupcakes are perfect for any special occasion and will make all your friends jealous of your incredible baking skills.
What do YOU think of this recipe? Let us know in the comments and don’t forget to SHARE the love and pass it on!
This recipe and all images are sourced from Bakerella. Find the original recipe here.
