I'm out of practice doing cupcakes here! My cupcakes browned more as they cooled. They also baked up above the tops of the papers a little but not crowned, which is okay ordinarily. For a cupcake cake or decorative cupcakes (beautiful ones I've seen for cupcake trees, etc) does anyone level the cupcakes before icing or ice as is. Also I wanted to add in a little bit of filling. I've used buttercream icing in the past but want something lighter and less sweet. Any sugestions? Only thing that comes to mind is adding some of my homemade lemon curd and beat it into a real fluff. Thanks for any help!

I have been wanting to try the twinkie filling in my cupcakes...sounds really good!

I remember seeing a tutorial with pictures someplace on making cupcake cakes. They used a heavy cutting board to place on top of the cupcakes (still in the pan) as soon as they came out of the oven, and that made the tops fairly level, similar to pressing on a full-sized cake to level it.

I've done it a time or two, and it works pretty well. You may want to put a piece of parchment paper over the cupcakes before the cutting board, just to keep the board from sticking to the cake.

Lemon curd sounds great for a filling - I've just recently "discovered" it and I love it!

Laura.

Yep, I have actually leveled 24 cupcakes before for a cupcake cake. Next time I will try a board.

I have an excellent recipe for a cupcake filling. It's a light white cream filling and it tastes good to everyone I know who has had it. If you are interested just PM me and I'll send it to you!! I like it in chocolate cupcakes, but I see no reason that it wouldn't be good in any other flavor as well!