Itsy Bitsy Foodies

The key to unlocking a girl’s heart: a little blue box tied with a white ribbon (filled with a piece of Tiffany’s jewelry, of course.)  The next best thing: a Nutella-filled cupcake made to look like the little blue box.

These Tiffany’s-inspired cupcakes were an elegant dessert to help my niece celebrate her 13th birthday in style.  They are simple, easy to make and sophisticated, perfect for a special occasion.  The Nutella and chocolate marshmallow cream filling made the Tiffany’s cupcake “gifts” complete.  You could skip the step of filling the cupcakes but I have to admit that chocolate cake mixed with Nutella and chocolate marshmallow cream makes for an excellent combination. 

Ingredients

Chocolate cake, baked as cupcakes

Buttercream frosting, with an additional 1-2 Tbsp milk

Blue food coloring

Green food coloring

Nutella

7-ounce jar of marshmallow cream

3/4 cup chocolate chips

1 Tbsp milk

Black satin ribbon

White satin ribbon

Black sewing pins

Pearl sewing pins

To make the Nutella and chocolate marshmallow cream-filled cupcakes, make the chocolate cupcakes and let them cool completely. 

To make the chocolate marshmallow cream, spoon the marshmallow cream into a large bowl.  Melt the chocolate chips in a saucepan over low heat until they melt.  Stir in roughly 1 Tbsp milk to reach the desired runny texture.  Then, stir the chocolate sauce into the marshmallow cream.

Fit an icing decorating bag with a large tip, and spoon Nutellainto the bag until it is half full.  Poke the icing tip through the top of the cupcake until it is roughly in the center of the cupcake.  Squeeze Nutella until a little bit seeps through the top.  (My icing tip ended up being too small to work with the Nutellaand marshmallow cream so I used the tip to poke a hole in each cupcake and then the icing tube fitted with the plastic coupler to fill the hole.  Next time, I will make an even bigger hole so that there is more Nutella with each bite of cupcake.)

Repeat the above process with all of the cupcakes, or fill half of them with the chocolate marshmallow cream. 

To make the signature Tiffany’s blue-colored frosting, add approximately 10 drops of blue food coloring and 8 drops of green food coloring.  I recommend adding the color one drop at a time and stirring it in before adding more food coloring.  It is easy to add color but once it is too dark it is harder to fix.  You can adjust the ratio as desired, depending on how light or dark of a shade you would like.

Ice the cupcakes generously.  Crumbs from the hole in the center of the cupcake will be exposed.  To prevent the crumbs from getting mixed into the frosting, add 1-2 Tbsp more milk to the buttercream frosting so that it is soft and easy to spread.

Tie little black and white bows and pin them into each iced cupcake.  If you would rather not use sewing pins, you can try simply placing the bows on each cupcake and gently pressing them into the icing.

Recipe inspiration: Thanks to my sister for the idea of these Tiffany’s-themed cupcakes.