Pumpkin Cupcakes Cake

DeniseBC's Note:

I needed something cute for our fall festival cakewalk at church this weekend and I found this recipe in the Better Homes and Gardens publication "Halloween tricks & treats". It was really easy; the hardest part was picking the orange and black M&M's out of the M&M's GHOUL'S Milk Chocolate Mix. If you live in a bigger city or can order online, you can probably order just orange and black ones to make this easier yet!

• Total Time: 1 hrs 50 mins
• Prep Time: 1 hrs 30 mins
• Cook Time: 20 mins

Ingredients:

Serves: 26

Yield: 26.0 cupcakes

• 1 (18 1/4 ounce) box devil's food cake mix
• 4 eggs
• 1 cup buttermilk
• 1/2 cup canola oil
• 2 (16 ounce) cans vanilla frosting
• orange food coloring (I used red and yellow per my packaging's instructions)
• 1 cup M&M' (black)
• 2 cups M&M's (orange)

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350. Line 26 cupcake cups with paper liners.
2. Beat the cake mix with the eggs, buttermilk and oil until blended. Divide the batter evenly between the prepared cupcake pans.
3. Bake for 15-20 minutes. Remove from the oven, transfer to a wire rack, and let cool completely.
4. Tint the vanilla frosting with the orange food coloring. Line the cupcakes snugly into a large pumpkin shape on a large plate or a piece of cardboard covered in foil. Follow this pattern-one row of 4 cupcakes, one row of 5, one row of 6, another of 5, another of 4. This leaves 2 cupcakes to be placed at the pumpkin's top for a stem.
5. Spread orange frosting over the cupcakes, covering them completely so they look like one big cake. Use black M&M's to outline the pumpkin, and to make the eyes, mouth and nose. Fill in the remaining area of the pumpkin with orange M&M's.

Reviews

[bzsoccermom]

This was so cute! I forgot the buttermilk, so I made the box recipe, and they were still wonderful. I couldn't find orange M&Ms (found black), so I used Reese's Pieces instead of M&Ms and the taste was fantastic. Finally, I only made 24 cupcakes, so I arranged them a little differently, using 3 on the bottom, 4 next, and then followed the arrangement listed. Since I absolutely stink at frosting, I was glad to find something that didn't require that, although I way underestimated the amount of time it would take. It was well worth it though. Thank you for sharing!