Marshmallow "cake" cupcake decoration

Today is my daughter's 15th birthday!  

Her request for chocolate cupcakes with peanut butter frosting met with approval from the enchanted menfolk around here.  

The best recipe I have ever found for chocolate PB is The Barefoot Contessa's which you can find here.  It is deeeeelicous!  The only adjustment I made was to add an additional cup of powdered sugar to the frosting so it would be a bit stiffer for piping.

I hurt my brain trying to come up with how to decorate these cupcakes.  I didn't want to make them Easter themed - this is HER big day, and brownish peanut butter frosting isn't exactly a looker on it's own.  

Isabelle has always LOVED marshmallows, so I wanted to somehow incorporate them into a decoration.  

And then it hit me - my poor aching brain had a good idea!  

Decorate a marshmallow to look like a tiny birthday cake and put it on top of the cupcake.

Muhaha!

Here is how you do it.

Poke a toothpick midway through a marshmallow.  Decorate the sides like you would a cake.

The toothpick allows you to turn the marshmallow while decorating and also serves as a "pick".  I had a block of floral foam sitting around, so I used it to hold the marshmallows while they dried.

Next, I broke a toothpick in two and pushed it into the top of the "cake".

Taking white icing, I covered the bottom part of the toothpick to make it look like a candle.

Then I used yellow icing on the tip to simulate a flame.

Cute, cheap, fast, and very easy to do!  The designs on the sides of the marshmallows can be as simple as you want - squiggles, stripes, polkadots, or whatever floats your boat.

Once they dried, I just stuck them into the frosting on the cupcakes.

All I had to then, was add one birthday girl!

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