A day among the cupcake jungles.: seanan

A day among the cupcake jungles.

Yesterday afternoon, at the request of my/Mira Grant's publisher, I took my little FlipVideo camera and my little clicky-flashy digital camera down to Cups and Cakes Bakery to document the process of making the famous BRAIN CUPCAKES. Because, well, it seemed like a good way to kill an hour or two. The bakery is closed on Tuesdays, so Tuesday was the best time to have a slightly off-kilter author come in and point cameras at things. It was fun!

I am aware that this thread is useless without pics. Pics will be coming soon, although the odds are reasonably high that they will be posted, not here, but on the Orbit website. Why? Because dude, brain cupcakes. Also, that way Orbit has to do the video hosting, not me. I like things that lead to other people doing the video hosting. Things that lead to other people doing the video hosting are keen.

It turns out, by the way, that people are a lot less willing to accept random cupcakes from a random stranger when those random cupcakes look like tiny frosting brains. This is more of a sign of a survival instinct than I usually see from the human race these days, so I'm going to take it as a good thing. It probably didn't help that I looked bone-tired while offering the tiny brains to people, which created an overall air of "zombie pastry chef" that can't possibly have appealed to the public at large. Many of my friends, sure, but the public at large, not so amazingly much.

I love the simplicity of these tiny sugary treats, their iconic awesomeness, the way that they just say, very straightforwardly, "this is what I am, I am a brain, you can cope." I find myself pondering other ways to make cupcakes relevant to my various projects (although with some projects, this requires no effort at all—Velveteen gets red velvet cupcakes with vanilla frosting and rainbow sprinkles, for superficial childishness atop adult complexity; Clady just gets whatever you're not eating...), because dude, cupcakes.

Everybody loves baked goods.

aineotter

June 9 2010, 14:35:41 UTC 7 years ago

New comment

Ooh!
My dad is a neuropathologist. I must learn how to make brain cupcakes for his next birthday. This means I have 'till March.

seanan_mcguire

June 9 2010, 14:48:23 UTC 7 years ago

Well, the tutorial will be going up soon!

smoooom

June 9 2010, 14:48:01 UTC 7 years ago

I'm not entirely sure I'd eat one from a known source. When I was 9 or son my Nan made brains on toast for breakfast. Since leaving food on your plate meant some poor child would DIE in Biafra, besides Nan had a nasty willow switch I did actually eat the whole thing. It was disgusting. I asked a nicely as I could that she never make me eat it again. I suspect my parents talked to her as well, because brains on toast was supposed to be good for you and all that stuff. I've had an aversion to brains ever since. Now if the cupcakes are chocolate it would be much easier to eat one.

June 9 2010, 16:29:50 UTC 7 years ago

Now *actual* brains are one thing I will not eat. Prions, and all that. Plus, brain is pretty much all fat, anyway.
Frosting and cake brains are a totally different matter.

7 years ago

tibicina

June 9 2010, 17:44:20 UTC 7 years ago

The brain cupcakes were cherry cordial, so chocolate cakes with a cherry hidden under the purple-ish frosting.

June 14 2010, 17:55:30 UTC 7 years ago

Yeah, I am not a happy brain-eater. No brains. Brain cupcakes are different.

sweetmusic_27

June 9 2010, 14:56:47 UTC 7 years ago

I can't wait for the cupcakes with the Aeslin Mice.

Cups and Cakes is going to be like, "You want us to put mice on them, okay, mice with...hats?"

"Yeah, do you know how to make a mitre out of frosting?"

"Um. We'll try? And some of them with words, okay, what words?"

"We're definitely going to need about half of them to say 'Hail!'"

"Okay, no problem."

"Can you fit 'Arboreal Priestess' on a cupcake?"

"Maaaayyyybeee?"