For Fox Sake

Anytime we have company visit, obviously, I roll out the red carpet by serving a dessert fit for royalty. I mean, how much of a let down would it be if you came to the house of someone with a blog named "Kate Bakes Cakes," only to be served stale Oreo's or a week-old, store-bought Walmart cake (that blog would probably be named "Kate Provides Disappointment")? Since my in-laws, the Foxes, drove out from Texas this weekend to spend some time with us, it provided me with the perfect opportunity to try out both a cupcake recipe and cupcake decorating technique I had been dying to use for a fall-themed dessert. So, for Foxes sake, these buttered rum cupcakes came to be:

A group of foxes is called a skulk, but there is absolutely NO skulking involved when you eat one of these.

So, the Foxes are here, and I have foxes for the Foxes. It's a foxton of foxiness. Aside from being absolutely adorable, these cupcakes are so delicious I can barely stand it (but that's probably a side effect of the gluten and not the flavors themselves). I have never had buttered rum before, let alone created it myself, and now I'm completely obsessed. I was thinking outside the fox with this recipe, and I am so glad I did. The cupcake has wonderful cinnamon and nutmeg flavors swirled with spiced rum, and they're even topped with more rum in the buttered rum glaze and the cinnamon rum cream cheese frosting. It's the perfect dessert for in-laws or pirates, really. And at only 111 calories a cupcake (24 cupcakes total), you can eat them like three at a time to cop a pretty decent buzz thanks to all that Sailor Jerry's.

The real MVP.

This is such a simple recipe that tastes anything but, and all you need to make these buttered rum cupcakes are:

• 1 box yellow sugar free cake mix
• 3 egg whites at room temp
  
• 1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce at room temp
  
• 1/2-3/4 cup of spiced rum (think Kraken, Sailor Jerry, or Captain Morgan. Pretty much, it should be named for or about pirates and the pirate life)*
• 1/2-3/4 cup of skim milk at room temp*
• 1 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp nutmeg

*The total amount of liquid you want to use is 1 1/4 cups. If you like being punched in the mouth by a pirate, use more rum; if you don't, opt for more skim milk. I only used 1 cup total of liquid, and I barely had enough batter for 24 cupcakes without that additional 1/4 cup. Lesson learned!

A few cupcakes ended up being very sad and small, but I'll eat them anyway.

Start by preheating the oven to 325 and lining two muffin tins with cupcake liners. Then dump all the ingredients into the bowl of stand mixer, blending on low for 30 seconds before bumping up the speed to medium high and mixing for two more minutes. Use a cookie scoop to help evenly distribute batter into your cupcake liners, and then bake the cupcakes for 18-21 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out of the center of a cupcake completely clean.

Your house is gonna smell like hot buttered rum, and it make cause you to turn into a swashbuckling pirate. Worth it.

Let your cupcakes cool in the pan for 10 minutes before removing to a cooling rack to cool completely. While they're cooling, you can make the buttered rum. Or butter yourself up with rum. Or both. Both is good.

You're gonna hate how easy this is.

Only because once you've learned how easy it is to make buttered rum, you're gonna make it weekly. Here's all you need: two tablespoons of butter, two tablespoons of rum, and 1.5 tsp of cornstarch. In a small saucepan, melt the butter on medium heat. Stir in the rum, and let things heat up for about 1 minute before adding in the cornstarch. Use a whisk to constantly stir until the mixture thickens up to a maple syrup type of consistency....side note, use buttered rum with maple syrup on your next stack of pancakes...will. change. your. life. Now, pour this into a bowl and let it cool for about 15 minutes.

Mmm, buttery rum goodness.

Use either a basting brush or the back of a spoon, and spread a layer of rum butter on top of each FULLY COOLED cupcake (if your cupcakes are warm, remember, butter is know for its meltability). Sadly, you will use every ounce of the rum butter for your cupcakes, so there won't be any left to lick out of the bowl. That just means you have to make more...

Good thing we've got a whole bottle of rum!

As exceptional as the rum butter is, it is made infinitely better with the addition of a cinnamon rum cream cheese frosting. To make:

• 1/2 cup of butter at room temp
• 8 ounces of 1/3 less fat cream cheese at room temp
• 1 TBS spiced rum
• 1/2 tsp vanilla
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
  
• 3 cups of Lakanto powered monkfruit sweetener
• Orange, maroon, and black gel dye 
• Oreos, cut into tiny triangles for ears
  

Start by whipping together the cream cheese and butter until fluffy, 2-3 minutes. Then add in the rum, vanilla, cinnamon, and powdered monkfruit. Blend on low for a few seconds, then switch to medium high and blend until everything is incorporated. Now, I had leftover black frosting (thanks, Halloween baking, reminding me once again why I live for you), but you will want to divvy up your frosting so you have a tiny bowl dyed black for the fox noses and eyes, and then divide the remaining frosting so 1/3 is left plain, and 2/3 is dyed orange with a drop or two of maroon to give your foxes a fur coat that is made for photo ops. I ended up having about 1/4 of my orange frosting left, so if you use all your frosting, this will figure into a bit higher calorie count.

Now, let's get foxy!

I used a piping bag fitted with a #12 round tip to place a ring of white frosting on top of each cupcake. Then I used an angled spatula to smooth out.

Sorry, there's some math here.

Now, fit a piping bag with a #21 open star tip and your orange frosting. Start by pretty much creating a plus sign on the top of your white frosting. Then, fill in only the top half of the plus sign:

And don't forget the ears!

I took an Oreo, scraped the cream off (maybe ate that cream), and cut each side of 1 Oreo into eighths. I think I needed to do this a few times since the Oreo tops refused to cooperate with me and crumbled into uneven pieces against my unyielding knife skills.

You are one handsome fox.

To finish, place your black frosting into a piping bag fitted with a small round tip (I used a #3). Dot the orange star on the bottom of the cupcake with a small mound of black frosting, and then come in and add small dots for eyes. And voila! You've created a cupcake that is almost too cute to eat but thankfully smells like a cinnamon-rum heaven to remind you it's worth devouring.

But wait, there's more! Or less, in this case.

Like I said earlier, I ran reaaallly tight on batter toward the end without the extra liquid. I had 6 cupcakes that were little half cupcakes, so to find a way to make them look less sad and tiny (working title of my autobiography), I knew this was a job for sprinkles. I fit another piping bag with a 2D tip and more of my orange frosting.

I swirled each with one large rose and topped with orange sanding sugar.

Then used my other bag of orange frosting with the #21 tip to pipe little stars around the edge.

And because nothing is done without flair...I added some fall foliage sprinkles I had leftover from previous bakes.

Honestly, they may be only half full, but they're completely filled in my heart thanks to those sprinkles. As sly and cutesy those foxes are, these roses are absolutely gorgeous.

Looks like fall decided to finally show up in Florida. On a plate.

I have to reiterate- BUTTERED RUM IS FANTASTIC. Guys, I know I try to sell you on everything I bake because dessert should be savored by all and in as many flavors as possible, but buttered rum cupcakes might just be peak fall flavor. Sorry pumpkin, you've been replaced. I am renouncing my basic white girl status. I am now solely interested in buttered rum flavor for fall.

Clearly, this fox approves.

Since these have both butter and a cream cheese frosting, be sure to keep your cupcakes in the fridge until you're ready to devour the whole skulk of them. I actually made these a week ahead and froze them, frosting and all, and I take a few out of the freezer at a time and let them thaw out in the fridge (only takes an hour or two) before we enjoy them after dinner. Happy to report that the Foxes are enjoying the foxes, and I am still completely pleased with both the amount of fox puns in this blog and the divine flavor combos of rum, cinnamon, and spiced cream cheese frosting with every bite. If you bring these to your Thanksgiving feast, you're gonna make whatever aunt or cousin you can't stand look real lame for bringing just a pumpkin pie. Have your cupcakes and savor that small, petty victory (zero fox given). 'Til next time, my fellow eaters!

You could also stay home, while being safe, and socially distancing from everything except these cupcakes.

One Last Nightmare Before Christmas

 As Baketober draws to a close, I knew I needed to create one last Nightmare Before Christmas, so to speak.You could argue literally everything about this year has been one big fat nightmare before Christmas, so my final spooky bake is firing on all cylinders, really...if you've got it, haunt it, I say. Many years ago when I first got into baking, I was commissioned to make a Jack Skellington birthday cake for a friend. To this day, it remains my most popular Pinterest creation, and every October, the repins go off the charts. I have come a long, long way since I made that cake in 2014, so I wanted to give old Jack an even more handsome cake countenance...

He is a witch's fondest dream, after all.

Quick-witted, legs-for-days, tune-carrying Jack Skellington with that wicked crooked smile always has been one of my favorite leading men, what can I say. My newest tribute to the Pumpkin King comes in the form of an orange creamsicle cake, and it is to die for...you could say I'm gonna be goblin up this cake with reckless abandon. Compared to Oogie Boogie's rich black velvet cake tribute, this cake is extremely light and almost summery...Jack would allow it since it means exploring other holidays like 4th of July World (pretty sure that wasn't a door in the movie, but you get my point). It has extremely refreshing bursts of orange flavor in an airy sponge cake with a tangy and sweet cream cheese frosting. It most definitely tastes exactly like an orange creamsicle in cake form, so mission accomplished, and at only 229 calories a slice (10 slices total), bone appetit, everyone, it's completely guilt free.

Orange you glad to see such easy ingredients?

Seriously, this is a very quick and easy cake recipe, I promise. All you need to make the cake layers are:

• 1 box sugar free yellow cake mix
• 3 egg whites
• 3/4 cup fresh-squeezed orange juice (I needed 2 large oranges)
• 1/2 cup of fat free or 2% skim milk (I use Fairlife fat free)
• 1/2 cup of unsweetened applesauce
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1-2 teaspoons orange extract (I used 2, and I love that there's no mistaking this is an orange-flavored cake)
• 1 box of sugar free orange Jell-o (they come in tiny boxes, but you really only need 1)

Preheat your oven to 325 and grease 3 6-inch round pans with cooking spray and bake even strips. Dump all your ingredients into a stand mixing bowl, blending on low for 30 seconds, then bump the speed up to medium-high for 2 minutes. Thanks to the orange Jell-o, you don't need to add any food coloring to make this cake pop with orange coloring. 

Now, evenly pour your batter between all 3 pans.

Bake at 325 for 25-28 minutes, until a toothpick comes out of each cake round clean. Leave your cakes in the pan on top of a cooling rack for 10 minutes so they're easier to handle. Then, with the help of some tea towels, flip each round out of the pan and leave on the cooling racks to finish cooling completely. I placed mine into the fridge to speed this process up. If you don't have bake even strips, you will probably need to level your cakes once they're fully cooled.

Orange like a Pumpkin King should be!

Now, there are a few things to accomplish while those cakes cool:

1. Make chocolate skulls.
2. Cut out Jack Skellington's face.
3. Mix and try not to eat all the orange cream cheese frosting.

I will use these skull molds for any and all reasons I can come up with.

I have a detailed account of how to make these skulls in this blog post from last Halloween. Head there to get the specifics!

And say hello to my little friends.

I believe I made 20 of these skulls for Jack's "crown," and only used 14. I made these last week and kept them in a single layer in a Tupperware at room temp. I actually hate the way chocolate melts taste, so I don't ever eat these (they also add 13 calories a pop to the calorie count above), but damned if I don't love how absolutely creepy they look.

Once again, I did not cut off a finger, X-acto knife win!

Much like Oogie, I used an X-acto knife and a template on Parchment paper to create Jack's face. I found this pumpkin carving template online, resized it to fit my cake (I used Canva to resize it, but you could copy and paste into Word or Paint and scale the size up or down as needed), and with the help of my X-acto knife and a cutting mat, I cut out what was needed:

I can't say no to a devilish smile.

I actually did this twice, because Jack's face is on two sides of my cake, so no matter what angle he's sitting at in my fridge, he's smiling at me every time I open it. I'm almost as love-struck as Sally.

Ah black cocoa, we meet again.

No, this isn't a black cocoa cream cheese frosting for the third blog in a row. Sort of...part of the frosting that needed to be black is, but the vast majority of the frosting is a plain orange cream cheese icing. To make, you need:

• 1/2 cup low fat butter 
• 8 ounces reduced fat cream cheese
• 1 tsp orange extract
• 1 tsp vanilla extract (optional: omit this and use 2 tsp orange extract if you want more orange flavor)
• 4 cups of Lakanto powdered monkfruit sweetener
• 3 tsp of skim milk, divided
• 1 TBS black cocoa
• Orange and black gel dyes
• Orange Spooky Sprinkles 
• 3 piping bags
• 1M or 2D piping tip

Start by mixing the butter and cream cheese on medium high for 2-3 minutes, until light and fluffy. Add in 2 cups of Lakanto, orange and vanilla extracts, and blend on low until fully mixed. Then add in the remaining 2 cups of Lakanto and 2 tsp of milk. Blend fully, and then take a heaping amount of frosting (I used 10 ounces), and set it aside in a medium bowl. Once this is done, add several dollops of orange gel dye to the frosting left in the stand mixer bowl. Mix well, and turn your attention back to the reserved frosting. Add the black cocoa, final teaspoon of milk, and some black gel dye to this, mixing by hand. Now, we're ready to assemble!

It smelled like a citrus factory at this point.

Put your first layer of cake face down on a cake board. Add a decent layer of frosting to the top of it smooth out, and repeat with the next layer. Add the final layer on top, then cover the cake completely in orange cream cheese frosting. Be sure to reserve some orange frosting for the swirls on top. I ended up with a bunch of leftover frosting (both orange and black), and I have it in Ziplocks in the freezer for the next time I just need to eat frosting and nothing else (I refuse to believe I'm the only person who does this).

EVERYTHING. GETS. SPRINKLES.

Once you've smoothed out the sides and top of the cake, very carefully pour the orange sprinkles on top, using light pressure with your fingers to get it to stick in place. This is a crusting frosting, so you can use the paper towl trick to smooth out imperfections once you've chilled your cake for 30 minutes.

I'm ahead of the carve here...

...you will need to chill it for 30 minutes anyway to help your black frosting layer from mushing into the orange completely. Once my 30 minutes was up, I smoothed out a few areas and then placed my templates on each side of the cake. I used a paintbrush and some small palette knives to make sure no edges of the template were sticking up. This will keep frosting from leaking through to the rest of the cake, so do not skip this step. I got sidetracked at some point (it was by food), so I put my cake back in the fridge for 15 minutes and came back to it to do my painting:

I am a messy artiste.

With the cake chilled, now you can use a small angled spatula or small palette knives to brush the black frosting over the template. You will want to use a bench scraper or the side of the angled spatula to smooth out this layer of frosting so it is evenly distributed and the layering isn't wonky.

A scare is born...

Once you've evened out the black frosting, carefully peel away your template, revealing the one and only Jack Skellington. You could call it a day, but I'm extra, so I wanted to give him a skull crown, too.

This is Halloween, everybody make a scene!

I placed my remaining orange frosting in one piping bag and the black in another. Then in a larger piping bag fitted with a 1M tip, in both of these bags went. I piped out a few dollops on a paper towel until the colors were both coming out evenly.

Spooookkkkyyyyy!

I simply piped stars around the top of the cake, but honestly, there's enough frosting to do larger swirls if you'd like.

Don't forget about my little friends.

Then I gently placed a skull into the top of each star.

And all was frightful.

And more sprinkles. Because it's me.

...and also because I forgot to clean off my cake board after frosting, so I wanted to hide some blotchy orange and black stains, and sprinkles are a great way to do this. While the outside of the cake is ORANGE (it might even glow in the dark?), the inside is a bit more subdued:

A nice, mellow orange. Sorry for the flashback, my photo takes potato-quality photos in evening light.

I'm giddy with delight at how cool this cake looks. It's a huge departure in style from the cake a novice baker tried her hand at 6 years ago. I enjoy baking in October so much because I can let my inner Wednesday Addams shine and come up with creepy cool cakes I'd love to bake every month, but I realize it wouldn't be as fun or unique if I did this ALL THE TIME. And in a year as useless as Halloween Town's mayor, it's been a ton of fun to have something to actually look forward to...especially when the end result is a delicious citrusy-orange cake with a heavenly smooth cream cheese frosting that I'm sad I have to share, but my husband definitely deserves cake after making it through shoulder surgery earlier this week *and* being married to my spooky self (he's gotta deal with all this spookiness 365 days a year). I'm already churning out new ideas for next October because I truly can't help myself. 'Til next time, my fellow eaters!

"And I just can't wait until next Halloween 'cause I've got some new ideas that will really make them scream..."

"Well, Well, Well, What Have We Here?"

I think we're all painfully aware at this point that 2020 is pretty much a sack filled with horrors (all things considered, I'm extremely glad murder hornets didn't become a bigger problem). I also happen to be a huge fan of another stitched up sack of gross curiosities- Oogie Boogie from Nightmare Before Christmas. I found myself singing "Oogie Boogie's Song" last week and realized that it's probably THE theme song for this year...for a multitude of reasons. Anyway, when a giant sack filled with worms and spiders tells you to watch out, you should definitely take heed. And while Jack Skellington will always own my heart (no, it's not weird that I have a lifelong crush on a cartoon skeleton- he's suave, creative, and smartly dressed), I feel like if any year deserves to be the year of the Boogie Man, it's this one.

This is not filled with spiders--just topped with them. Big difference.

Guys, it could realistically be none more black than this...and that's thanks to the magic ingredient: black cocoa powder. I can finally give you a visual reference to the color of my heart and soul, and it's thanks to chocolate. This is both the definition of irony and totally appropriate. This black velvet cake and tribute to the Oogie Boogie Man is filled with black cocoa powder both in the cake and in the chocolate cream cheese frosting (I am addicted to it). It tastes EXACTLY LIKE A GIANT OREO. I am convinced the folks at Nabisco have been harboring this as a secret, but black cocoa gives a richness that truly tastes exactly like everyone's favorite sandwich cookie--except mine is in cake form (and gluten free), making it at least 75% better than an Oreo. It's also only 280 calories a slice (9 slices total), or the equivalent of a meager 4 Oreo cookies. Black velvet cake is now a staple recipe in this house.

The hardest part of baking this cake is finding black cocoa powder.

It's awesome that this is so easy to throw together because I'm going to need to make one of these a month until I die. You need:

• 1 1/4 cups Lakanto monkfruit or Swerve Granular
• 1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
  
• 2 eggs at room temp
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
  
• A dash of salt
• 3/4 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 cup + 2 TBS buttermilk (omit the 2 TBS if you're using regular flour; the gluten free flour needs a little more moisture)
• 1/2 cup of hot water (I used my Keurig to brew hot water, but a sauce pan or microwave will work)
• 1/2 cup of black cocoa (link above to purchase on Amazon) 
• 1 1/2 cups of Bob's Red Mill 1:1 Gluten Free Flour Blend (or All Purpose if you're fortunate enough to not have a stomach that revolts near bread)

Start by preheating your oven to 350 and greasing two 8-inch round or square pans and lining with Parchment paper...I tried making this in only one 8-inch square pan, and it took forever to cook and my edges got dry and crumbly, so definitely split this into two pans. Blend the applesauce and sugar on medium-high in a stand mixer for 2-3 minutes, until the mixture looks a little fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time, blending til fully incorporated. Then add in the extract, salt, baking soda, and baking powder.

While things are mixing together, in a separate bowl, whisk together the hot water and buttermilk. Then whisk in the black cocoa powder until absolutely no lumps remain. Measure out your flour in another bowl.

Now, add 1/3 of the flour to your stand mixer bowl, blending until fully mixed in. Scrape the sides of the bowl, then add 1/2 of the cocoa mix, blending on low so you don't make a huge mess. Scrape the sides of the bowl, then add another 1/3 of flour, blend, then the remaining 1/2 of the cocoa mix, blend, and finish with the last of the flour. Mix until things have come together nicely on medium-high. Pour into your 2 prepared pans.

See, same color as an Oreo.

Bake at 350 for 30 minutes, testing with a toothpick. If you only have a few crumbs, remove from the oven. If the toothpick is still very wet with batter, continue baking another 3-5 minutes. Keeping the cakes in the pans, place onto a cooling rack for 10 minutes before running an angled spatula or dull knife around the edges of the pan before turning out on the cooling racks to cool completely. I placed my cake in the freeze for 15 minutes before leveling since it domed up on me (again, too much batter for one single pan, don't make the same mistake).

It looks a little sad with half of its head cut off, but look at that black cocoa magic!

Now, set this aside to finish cooling completely while you make what is, quite literally, the best chocolate frosting that ever existed.

Seriously, my only regret is it took 33 years to find out about black cocoa powder.

For the blackest of black, so-dark-it-could-be-an-endless-void cream cheese frosting, you need:

• 8 ounces reduced fat cream cheese at room temp
• 1/2 cup of light butter at room temp (I used Land O Lakes)
• 4 cups of Lakanto powdered monkfruit (or regular powdered sugar if you aren't watching your intake)
  
• 1/2 cup of black cocoa powder
• 1 TBS of vanilla
• 2-3 TBS skim milk
• Black and lime green gel dyes

You're going to be splitting this frosting up to dye two different colors, so keep that in mind. Begin by mixing the cream cheese and butter together until fluffy, for about 3 minutes. Add in 2 cups of powdered monkfruit, mixing on low at first to avoid an explosion, then switch to medium-high until blended. Add in the vanilla extract and remaining powdered monkfruit, blending well. Now, take about 1/3 of the frosting and put it aside in a bowl, this will need to get several drops of  lime green gel dye mixed into it for Ooogie Boogie. Cover with a paper towel until ready to use. Now, turn your attention back to the rest of the frosting. Add in the black cocoa powder and at least 2 TBS of skim milk to thin this out so it is a spreadable consistency. Mix well, and if you see it's still incredibly thick (hard to stir with a spatula by hand), add another TBS of skim milk. Then add in a few drops of black gel dye to make this frosting so black you could lose an entire coven of witches in it. Now, on to the knives!

It's a Boogie Man cake, of course we're going to play with knives to create it.

A face only Lock, Shock, and Barrel could love.

For my Oogie Boogie, I sketched him out on Parchment paper with the help of an Oogie Boogie pumpkin carving template sized down to fit the top of my cake. You're also going to need an X-acto knife, scissors, fun Halloween sprinkles (Spooky Sprinkles!), and either a few palette knives or angled spatulas to make Oogie, boogie, to life. I really wanted to use some gummy worms with this cake, but I could only find Trolli's, and they look absolutely NOTHING like real worms, so consider me very disappointed. Sorry, Oogie.

He's no Jack Skellington, but he's a handsome devil in his own right.

Put your template down on a cutting mat or board, and use the X-acto knife to cut out his mouth, eyes, and the inside of the O'S and the G. Save these pieces!! You need them later. You also need to cut out the rest of the letters, but you don't need to keep these. Also cut out his silhouette (I used scissors because I considered it extremely fortunate I hadn't lost the tip of a finger to the X-acto at this point). You should pretty much have a reverse image:

"You're jokin', you're jokin'
I can't believe my eyes!"

You can set this aside while you frost the completely cooled cake with the blacker-than-a-black-hole portion of frosting. Since you'll have two layers, place one layer down on a cake board before spread a decent amount of frosting on the top of it, then add the second layer, and completely cover the entire cake in the black frosting. You'll probably use all of the black frosting (and will lick the bowl for the rest). This does crust, so if you want to smooth it out with the paper towel trick, you totally can. I kept things a little messy because this is a cake tribute to a creature that vomits worms, so neatness was not my concern.

Time to get sprinkly!

Now, place your cake on a large baking tray so you don't get sprinkles EVERYWHERE. I cleaned my house the day after I made this, and not gonna lie, I found sprinkles in a 100-foot radius of my kitchen, but I sprinkle with gusto.

I needed a bigger tray, apparently.

I used a Halloween mix of sprinkles, all by Wilton and found at a craft store. I used a mix of black, purple, and green sprinkles, pouring a handful into my palm before gently pressing on the sides of the cake. Once I was done with that, I came back in and gently placed skull sprinkles at the top of the border:

I mean, look at that frosting. Black velvet, indeed.

Once you're done making a mess your dogs will be so happy to help you clean up, place your template on top of the cake.

I was giddy with delight at this point.

I used toothpicks to help nail down my template, and to help me keep track of where the smaller pieces like the eyes, mouth, and insides of the letters were placed on my cake. I also used a paintbrush and an angled spatula to push my template down into the frosting a bit. You just want to make sure there are ZERO gaps (ah Zero, easily the best character of Nightmare Before Christmas). I put my cake in the fridge for 30 minutes to allow my black frosting to crust up so it wouldn't bleed too much into the green.

I think I also found the Nickelodeon slime recipe?

Using a very skinny palette knife, I slathered a thick layer of green frosting over OOGIE, only marginally spreading to even it out. Again, a sack of horrors cake does not require smoothed perfection, but if you're feeling twitchy about that, use an angled spatula to swipe everything perfectly even...I will always make an exception for OCD.

Definitely slime. The jig is up, Nick.

Come back in with more green frosting and gently spread over the rest of Oogie's body, eyes, and mouth. You want to apply minimal pressure while you're spreading out the green frosting so you don't disrupt the template. Now comes the terrifyingly fun part!

Oh we're getting spooky, alright.

Using the toothpicks, gently wiggle the templates straight up and away so as not to disturb the green frosting. I also used a very pointy palette knife to help with larger pieces. Repeat until you unmask the Boogie Man in all his grotesque glory:

Oh heeeyyyy, nightmare fuel.

I ended up not using the Trolli's since they looked more like pencils than worms, but if you can find real gummy worms, you could stick one coming out of Oogie's mouth, and then spread some around the top of the cake. I ended up using the leftover green frosting to outfit Oogie in his second favorite critter, spiders.

He needs them to bake a special batch of his snake and spider stew.

I put a coupler on a piping bag, filled it with my green frosting, and alternated between a round 12, 5, and 2 tip to make my spiders. Starting with the #12 tip, I piped little circular blobs around the cake.

Only in the month of October do I condone "spidering" your baked goods.

Switch over to the #5 tip, then add little blobs in front of the body to make the spider's head.

But wait, there's gore more!

To finish, switch to the #2 tip and pipe 8 little legs on each spider in straight-ish lines.

He's...cute?

To make them less terrifying (I have to eat this cake after all, and I HATE SPIDERS), I used little individual sprinkles to give my spiders TWO, ONLY TWO eyes. They're far less shiver-inducing with only two ojos and not eight. Although I do admire the symmetry of having eight legs and eight eyes, this is where my respect for spiders ends.

Oh, good sir, you are delightfully awful.

I am SO happy with a multitude of things about this cake: it is so black it could use a nightlight, Oogie is so creepy he could spring off the cake to gamble with you (or your life), and it tastes like the world's greatest Oreo. *Insert any color* velvet cakes are always so dense, and this is definitely no exception. I don't make velvet cakes often since I do prefer a lighter sponge, but since this cake tastes exactly like an Oreo, it pairs excellently with a glass of milk to wash it down. I went on and on in the last blog about a regular chocolate cream cheese frosting, but black cocoa powder makes that batch the poor man's chocolate cream cheese frosting for sure. This is silky, creamy, and deeply chocolately. It isn't like a light cocoa vs dark cocoa flavor; black cocoa frosting is not at all bitter like a bar of dark chocolate. It gives a real richness that pretty much makes the frosting and cake party on your taste buds. Since trick-or-treating is probably out this year (the true horror here is 2020, not my terrible puns), you could just make this cake instead and reluctantly share it with your children. Definitely keep your cake in the fridge for as long as it lasts to keep the cream cheese frosting firm.

I, on the other hand, refuse to share.

I had to put a few slices in the freezer while my husband is out of town this week...there's no way it would still exist anywhere else but in my stomach if I didn't, and I want him to have the giant Oreo cake experience because although I am evil, I'm not mean...there is a difference. It's the thinnest of lines, but even villains have their moments of kindness. You know, like when Oogie didn't actually kill Santa Claus. He just sang about how he wanted to instead; see, thin line. 'Til next time my fellow eaters!

If I eat another slice, "I might just split a seam..."