Owl Cakes for Emily

As much as I love Chicago, some of my favorite things are still in Boston. Included in that list of things I miss from the homeland are some of my favorite people on the planet. These cupcakes go out to Emillama, who I miss terribly. Emily loves owls and the color yellow almost as much as I love her.

Inspired by: Emillama.

Best enjoyed: While listening to The Concretes on an autumn afternoon when the sun makes everything look shades of orange.

Turning Japanese.

My dear friend Emillama and I share a birthday week and a love for delicious baked goods. To honor the day she was expelled from a uterus, I decided to try my hand at an ambitions cake decorating project. Emily loves green tea and all things Japanese, so I wanted to go with a Japanese/sushi theme for her cake. The cake is a vegan green tea mini cake (recipe from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World). The cherry blossoms are made of marzipan and the "sushi" is made from halved marshmallows which I frosted and rolled in green sugar. They're topped with white buttercream and coconut "rice", and the center of the sushi rolls is just some organic dried papaya pieces. I initially intended to make the entire cake vegan, but the marshmallows worked too well to pass up. The cake and frosting are 100% vegan.

Inspired by emillama, The Vapors, and the Wilton mini-cake pan that I've been dying to use.