So after baking your cupcakes and mixing up the frosting you want to use for your cupcake, the next step of making a perfect cupcake is to decorate it and make it look presentable. Decorating your cupcake is one of the most interesting part of the whole baking process as you get to let your imagination and creativity run wild. A tip when decorating is to ensure that the cupcakes have cooled completely before starting to pipe on the frosting. This prevents the frosting from melting.

Some of you out there may not have any piping equipments at home but fret not! In this blog post, I will be sharing with you how to pipe without the use of a piping bag; all you need is just a zip-lock bag and it will do the same thing as a piping bag and tip. Let’s get started!!

How to pipe using a Zip-Lock bag

Simple Circle

1. Fill the Ziploc bag with icing and close the top. Use scissors to snip off one corner of the bag, about 1 cm wide.

2. Using two hands, one near the top to push the icing downwards and one near the opening to guide the icing along, hold the opening 1/2 inch up from the cupcake so that the frosting is not squashed as it comes out. Slowly pipe out a swirl while keeping the tip lifted from the previously piped icing.

3. At the top of the frosting, lift the Ziploc bag straight up to create a little point.

Rose

1. Make a small triangle(A) by folding at one tip of the zip lock bag and in that small triangle(A) that you have folded cut out another smaller triangle. This forms a small square after you have unfolded A.

2. Place your frosting into the ziplock bag.

3. When piping, turn your hand to the maximum in one direction and holding your cupcake and squeezing the zip lock bag gently, slowly rotate your hand with the cupcake back in the other direction. Do this till you get the desired shape of your rose.

4. When you are happy with the shape of your rose, do not put any pressure on the zip lock bag and  just lift it up.

Daisies

1. Make a small triangle(A) by folding at one tip of the zip lock bag and in that small triangle(A) that you have folded cut out another smaller triangle. This forms a small square after you have unfolded A.

2. Place your frosting into the ziplock bag.

3. Squeeze the frosting out to create the petals of the daisies. Each squeeze will produce 2 petals that are opposite to one another. Stop applying pressure once you are happy with the size of your petal. Lift up your ziplock bag and turn it slightly so that you get your ziplock bag beside the petal you have already piped and continue piping the petals.

4. Just go in one complete circle to produce all the flower petals.

5. Place a smartie or an M&M in the centre of the flower petals if you do not want to use another colour frosting to create the flower bud.

6. For smaller daisies, just squeeze out less frosting each time.

Leaf

1. Make a small triangle cut on one side of the zip lock bag. This creates a small notch on one side of the bag.

2. Fill your zip lock bag with frosting

3. When piping, make sure the uncut plastic portion is facing the top and the apply pressure and slightly push and pull back(Like a jiggling motion) to create a leaf with veins (adds more texture to the leaf). If you do not want your leaf to have veins, just simple push and pull bag slowly reducing the pressure applied.

Chrysanthemum

1. Make a small triangle cut on one side of the zip lock bag. This creates a small notch on one side of the bag.

2. Fill your zip lock bag with frosting

3. When piping, make sure the cut end of the plastic is facing upwards.Squeeze the bag and lightly release pressure as you reach the tip of the petals.

4. Go all around the cupcake until you have created the desired size of your flower.

Camellias

1. At the corner of your piping bag, make a small triangle. Cut halfway through the centre of that small triangle.

2. Fill your zip lock bag with frosting

3. Squeeze and stop before lifting up the zip lock bag and rotate the cupcake slightly and repeat the piping step till you are happy with the piped results.

Rose buds

1. At the corner of your piping bag, make a small triangle. Cut halfway through the centre of that small triangle. Fold the bag over and flatten the bag and then make another small triangle and cut halfway through that triangle. Try to keep the distance cut between the two triangles equal

2. Twist your wrist holding the cupcake all the way to the maximum and then squeeze out the frosting and slowly rotate your wrist holding the cupcake in the opposite direction.

3. Keep rotating your wrist till you are happy with the size of the rose bud

PIping without a zip-lock bag

Spike Effect

1. Smear a generous helping of icing on the cupcake using a butter knife. Don’t worry about making it look nice.

2. Take your clean finger and dab down on the icing, then lift it up to create a little spike.

3. Continue to dab, dab, dab until the cupcake is covered with little points.

Swirl Effect

1. Smear a generous helping of icing on the cupcake using a butter knife. Don’t worry about making it look nice.

2. Take your finger, and starting on the outside of the cupcake swirl it around in a circle towards the inside. You might need to do that step twice to get a defined swirl showing up. This creates a casual, floral look for cupcakes.

3. Add fancy sprinkles or small flower sugars to make the cupcake look nicer and to cover up any untidiness of the swirl.

Criss-Cross Effect

1. Smear a generous helping of icing on the cupcake using a butter knife. Don’t worry about making it look nice.

2. Smooth the icing out a little and then use the tip of your index finger to make three or four horizontal stripes on the icing. Rotate the cupcake 90 degrees and make another three or four horizontal stripes that cross over your first set.

3. Use toothpicks to draw the lines for a more defined pattern

Give these simple decorating methods a try and be amazed by some of its amazing results 🙂

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