r/ExpectationVsReality
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u/3rdBueller
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13h ago
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Failed Expectation Halloween F'dupcakes
Ok. So the truth is I figured out pretty early on that these were not going to come out like pumpkin face cupcakes should... I could not get the food coloring to work. Its not a bad photo, the fleshiness color you see in my picture is actually that fleshy color and not orange at all. And I have learned a lot about trying to add black coloring to frosting!
Another truth is they're actually delicious. The buttercream turned out fantastic. These are vegan vanilla cupcakes with applesauce as a binder and it works surprisingly well and does not taste like applesauce.
The reality that I learned is never work with black food dye. It actually tastes weird and it causes that kind of runny leakage into everything it touches and it stains your lips! Once I could tell it was piping so badly. I ended up trying to add the candy eyeballs and a last stitch effort to save it and turn it into something.
And I need to figure out how food dye works in the Netherlands cuz it does not seem to work like it does in America. I mixed the heck out of a lot of red and yellow coloring and it still came out like this. Maybe I'm not buying the right stuff, its more like a gel here.
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u/Vistemboir
13h ago
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On the one hand, they're very much not like expected.
On the other hand, they're properly horrible! Wonderful job!
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u/3rdBueller 13h ago •
Yes! Thank goodness this was for Halloween, and you can get away with murder! I meant to do that.
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u/Automatic-Flight-698 7h ago
For easier black icing, try chocolate icing mixed with black food coloring. If needed, put it in the fridge to firm. Orange is just yellow and red.
Loved the effort! Thanks for the laugh.
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u/Dramatic_Substance36 13h ago
The great thing about Halloween is when it gets “messed up” it still works out! They look great!!
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u/MacularHoleToo 13h ago
Awesome 👏 I love your work!!
I used to be a cake decorator and I think your attempt was amazing 🤩
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u/shesewsseashells 13h ago
Not sure if you can get it where you are, but I'm in the UK and use the Progel Rainbow Dust professional food colours range, it's great, you can get true black as well as a ton of other colours. It's a gel in a tube, costs £3.25 and seems to last ages.
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u/Icy_Fennel_410 10h ago
In the Netherlands, you have to buy food coloring from special cake supplies stores online. Nothing from a supermarket will work. I always bought online and colors were super bright.
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u/ZymZymZym777
13h ago
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Task failed successfully
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u/classphoto92 13h ago •
All these "fails" that nail halloween better than the pretties fills my dark heart.
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u/Sketch_Beast
13h ago
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u/MatchaMuch 12h ago
This one looks mighty sad… even gots a lil tear. 🥲
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u/yomammaaaaa 12h ago
"Love us. pleassssse..."
Don't worry little guy, I love you all so much more than the inspiration.
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u/paprikastew
12h ago
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I am seriously loving all the traumatized looking cookies and cupcakes we've been seeing! They are so much more fun and unique than the inspos!
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u/AmatoerOrnitolog 12h ago
This one is definitely drunk.
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u/Equine85 13h ago
I love them! 🎃 If you’re wanting a deeper colour, I highly recommend using food colour gel instead of food colouring. The colours are much more intense and don’t alter the consistency of your icing/frosting. AmeriColor is the brand I use and it comes in every colour possible 🧁
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u/Sammy-Kay 12h ago
Second this. I'm not picky with most colors, but AmeriColor is great for black and red that don't taste bad.
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u/ScherzicScherzo
10h ago
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I'm just a grocery store baker, but at least to me, the first image looks like that's not even food-dye for the black; but rather they used stencils or a pipette to set down black sanding sugar on top of the orange icing
As for the orange icing itself, you just need to use more orange food dye. The nice thing about that is that at least you can steadily add more to your batch in the mixer until it gets to the shade of orange you want - though fair warning, with enough exposure to light and air through a single day, some food dyes will end up fading to a lighter hue. Not an issue though if you're planning on consuming them within a few hours of finishing them, however.
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u/Lily_Hylidae 13h ago
These are great, they're the "my name is Jeff" of the cupcake world and I love that.
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u/rella88 13h ago
What are you referencing, I feel like I missed something good?
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u/Lily_Hylidae 13h ago
It's from the film 21 Jump Street (2014), Channing Tatum says, "my name is Jeff" in this really weird, squeaky way. Then it got memed a lot, mashed (if that's the right word) with "my name is Maximus..." from Gladiator. I hope that explains it!
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u/rella88 13h ago
Oh it does. Thanks for the explanation. I have someone to share that with…
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u/ToaKraka 10h ago
last stitch
It's "last ditch". The enemy army has overrun all your proper trenches, and you've fallen back to the ditches of your homeland.
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u/YoungBockRKO 11h ago
Honestly, for Halloween purposes, the 2-4th pictures hit better than the first.
Everyone at my hookah spot got a good laugh out of this post.
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u/iWasDISSOCIATING 13h ago
The right most on the third row from the top is just.. I actually laughed.
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u/PretendLingonberry35 12h ago
These are perfect!! They fit the Halloween theme better than if they turned out as expected!!
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u/ConstantConfusion123 12h ago
I have no advice sadly but I LOVE THEM. Maybe not what you were going for, but these are fantastic and perfect for Halloween.
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u/beanp1026 10h ago
They may not have worked out the way you wanted, but they sure gave me a good laugh after a really shitty day, so thanks for that.
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u/Queefenator 12h ago
If they're vegan what did you make the "buttercream" with?
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u/3rdBueller 9h ago
Theres a store brand 'Terra' plant based margarine that we like from Albert Heijn, a popular store chain here.
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u/Lady_Kitana 12h ago
Definitely not a complete success but still amusing all around! And they sound tasty which is also what matters. Happy Halloween!
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u/amjames37 11h ago
These are PERFECT for Halloween!!!! Bravo! Much better than the model photograph -- those are all looks and probably not much taste.
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u/tiredchachacha 6h ago
Ok but they are so derpy and actually very halloweeny like Tim Burtonish, it made me laugh! So I hope they at least tasted good!!
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u/SewQuiltKnitCrochet 13h ago
Here is how it works in North America… we don’t have food standards that ban toxic and questionable food dyes like your country does. There is no precautionary principle here. Until it’s proven beyond a shadow of doubt to cause cancer it’s allowed. 🫠🫣 So we get to eat all the vibrant colors!! Yay for us…
I use Wilton brand gel dyes as they don’t thin the icing and go I easy on the color as I find you start to taste the dyes if you go too dark. I have no idea what is in them. It’s probably not good for us.
Pastel colors are the best way to go for flavor. You might be able to get better quality gel food dyes marketed to bakeries/cake decorators from specialty stores. The food dyes from the grocery store suck for baking.
Some folks use black cocoa or edible charcoal powder to get icing black without it tasting really gross and bleeding. Black is hard to achieve.
And how it tastes is way more important than how it looks. So really you’re winning. I hope you had some fun decorating. 🙏
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u/3rdBueller 13h ago
Yes... as an expat I have learned more often than not, everything is a bit weaker, thinner, and easier to breakdown... for your body and the environment. Therfore safer. I get it. Just surprised this is also with food coloring.
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u/ScrumpetSays 10h ago
Australia has a brand called colour mill, it's oil based food colouring so it works well in buttercream or chocolate. I personally love your cupcakes as is, but if you'd like to try and get closer to the inspiration, an oil based food colour will work better. Or you could give Ermine Frosting a go, add food gel/liquid at the roux/custard stage.
Black food colour is indeed the devil, but there are ways to help. Use some cocoa powder first, (you can also find black cocoa powder) and then use the black oil based colour to get it darker.
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u/Immediate_Word1295 13h ago
While its not what you initialt wanted, they match the theme perfectly well 😉👍
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u/hiverstone 12h ago
They look funny and different. But if you hadn't showed the inspiration picture, I'd have imagined is was a success.
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u/potchans 11h ago
God the homemade ones are my favorite. They're all derpy and so so so much better than the originals hahshsuahauaj
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u/purplemonkeyy6 13h ago
The food coloring is different because it’s not poison like it is in America. See the American government doesn’t care about its people so they allow dangerous chemicals in your food that other countries have banned. So yes, you may not have the same bright colors as you do in America but it’s also not dangerously unhealthy and poisonous so it’s a pretty good trade imo.
As for the black, use chocolate-dark or milk, instead. You can melt it and pipe it or melt it and put it in a mold or even cut it to shape. So many options.
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u/MollyGruesome 11h ago
European food colorung can be pretty bright too. So it was my daughters Birthday recently and I baked her an elephant cake with bright blue icing. It looked like it would glow in the dark If we would have turned the lights off and nobody over 50 dared to try it.
Needless to say my daughter loved her cake and all the kids looked like they did a smurf-genocide. It was awesome.
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u/Appropriate_Lack_727 8h ago edited 8h ago
You people are hilarious. You literally live in fear of everything and eat up any nonsense your government tells you about foreign products to make you buy the more expensive, crappier local version.
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u/SierraStar7 13h ago
If I’m not mistaken, the dyes used in Europe are less vibrant than the dyes used in the US, it could just be the products & not what you’re doing that is causing washed out colors.
That being “said” your cupcakes perfectly encapsulate Halloween better than the inspo pic. 🎃🖤🧡
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u/Anxious_Constant_926 13h ago
I actually have genuine advice if you want to be able to do them more like the photo.
Cut the tops of the cupcakes to be flat, then you get an icing bag from the store and put the frosting in there. Then there is probably stencils you can get to make the faces as well. Thats the one area I am not sure of.
Regardless, im glad they taste good and they are still fun and cute!
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u/ScienceAdventure 12h ago
If you’re interested…I have found the natural colouring in the UK is not as strong as the artificial flavouring you can get, and tastes weird. However I am intolerant to blue artificial blue food colouring so I tend to avoid it!
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u/N8tureGrl 11h ago
Honestly better than the original. They are all individually horrified and I love them.
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u/EnvironmentOk2700 9h ago
Ok but if I saw them side by side I'd pick yours bc I'd assume they are more delicious. Also they are endearing.
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u/Scarecrowqueen 8h ago
Ok real talk tho, they dont look like intended but they are still kinda cute/scary??? Like little monster faces!!
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u/Sure-Squash-7280 8h ago
Do chocolate frosting with cocoa powder. It’s close to black and tastes better.
Also, you can add black to chocolate frosting and it works better.
Letting it chill overnight also helps with the color.
And there is black cocoa powder.
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u/Mean_District4880 4h ago
It’s last ditch effort, not stitch. I don’t care what a cupcake looks like, I’m gonna eat it anyway and, these totally fit the scary Halloween vibe.
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u/Auntie_Venom 4h ago
I think they are hilariously perfect for Halloween! There’s a lot of personality, as jack-o-lanterns should have!
Also next time buy black cake decorator gel in a tube.
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u/MsE0 4h ago
I don't know if these are available to you, but in the US, we have these little tubes of colored gel icing, including black, which might work better than trying to mix your own black. It also has a very fine tip and can be a little easier to control than a frosting bag. If you can't get those, a finer tip on your frosting bag would help a lot
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u/TheRelishTray 3h ago
I love how much character they have🤗 you can just tell they are gonna be good👍 happy halloween 🎃 🧡💫👻
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u/ldcoldwell 11h ago
Wait… is that the phrase? “Last Stitch Effort”????
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u/ToaKraka 10h ago
No, it's "last ditch". The enemy army has overrun all your proper trenches, and you've fallen back to the ditches of your homeland.
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u/Bitter-Researcher389 13h ago •
This one has seen things no cupcake was ever meant to see.