We STILL have mini candy canes laying around our dorm! We tried to get rid of them with our Candy Cane Sleds and Ornament Cake Balls over the winter holidays, but to no avail. Luckily for us, as we were combing Pinterest for the cutest, most ridiculous, and most clever Valentine’s Day themed pins, we came across these adorable cupcake toppers! How had we never realized that 2 mini candy canes make a heart shape? (Really- is this common knowledge?)

We decided to try out this quick and easy idea for a couple of reasons. First, we can finally get rid of that giant box of candy canes; second, we love things that look adorable with minimal work. You may call it cutting corners; we call it being efficient! (All hail to the hectic college schedule!)

First, we gathered our ingredients. you’ll need:

• cake mix (we used red velvet to stick with the theme- plus it came with an icing mix!)
• eggs, water, etc according to the mix directions
• twice the number of mini candy canes as cupcakes you want to make
• icing and sprinkles if you’d like

After mixing your batter, fill your cupcake pan- each pocket should be about 2/3 of the way full.

Bake the cupcakes according to the package directions.

To decorate, we decided to use white icing and red-colored sugar.

Tip for making the icing pretty: put the icing in a sandwich-size ziplock bag. Smush it into one corner of the bag and snip the tip of that corner off using scissors. Now you can create pretty designs (like our swirls) by squeezing the icing out of the small hole in the bag!

Once your cupcakes are iced and sprinkled, unwrap 2 of the mini candy canes. Stick the long ends into the top of the cupcake diagonally so they create a heart-shape, as pictured below.

That’s it! For being so incredibly simple, these cupcakes turn out yummy and cute. The tiny amount of work you do compared to how they look definitely put these at the top of our list! They were a hit when we brought them to a party this weekend- everyone loved the fact that they got a bonus treat of the candy canes along with the cupcake!

Keep checking back for more Valentine’s Day shenanigans- we have a few more pins lined up that we can’t wait to try! Also, be sure to check out our Valentine’s Day Bread!

Note: we still have mini candy canes left…

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