Garnishing cupcakes takes cupcakes from homemade, right to professional with only a few simple additions.
You can use sprinkles, fruit, chocolate decorations, zest, cocoa powder, and more to garnish your cupcakes!
Make your cupcakes eye catching and mesmerizing using these simple garnish ideas for cupcakes.
Sprinkles
Sprinkles are the most popular garnish for cupcakes!
You can get beautiful white, clear, colored sprinkles that come in all shorts of shapes and sizes.
Gently sprinkle your sprinkles on the tops of your cupcakes as to not overwhelm them!
A couple of sprinkles goes a long way for a garnish!
Zest
You can add lime zest, lemon zest, or orange zest to the top of your cupcakes for a beautiful pop of color.
Make sure your zest matches the flavoring of your cupcakes, or compliments the flavor before using zest as a garnish for cupcakes.
Cocoa Powder
You can add a little dusting of cocoa powder to the top of cupcakes for an added decoration.
Only add a sparing amount, because by itself, cocoa powder is quite bitter tasting.
Only add cocoa powder to chocolate cupcakes as a garnish.
Mint Leaves
You can arrange a few mint leaves in the icing on top of your cupcake for a vibrant pop of green color.
Mint leaves go well with chocolate cupcakes as a garnish.
Chocolate scrolls
Use a potato peeler and grate the chocolate away from you to create chocolate scrolls on top of your cupcakes.
White chocolate scrolls work well with most cupcake flavors.
Fresh Fruit
Chocolate Garnish
Chocolate garnishes can be made into countless designs, using your own imagination! You can pipe chocolate hearts, words, stars, butterflies, etc.
Once you’ve piped your chocolate into your beautiful garnish, place it in the freezer to hard up.
Then gently place it into the icing on your cupcake for a stunning garnish to your cupcakes.
Writing
You can write a chocolate garnish with a saying or word using handwriting. This way, word will stay all one piece.
After you’ve completed the word, trace a line underneath the word to make the letters reinforced, or have something that will be easily stuck into your cupcake.
Chocolate Leaf
You can paint melted chocolate onto a fresh leaf from the garden using a food safe paintbrush.
Let the chocolate leaf dry fully in the freezer. Then, peel off the leaf from the chocolate and place the chocolate leaf onto your cupcake.
How to pipe a chocolate garnish for cupcakes
- Melt your chocolate in 30 second intervals until it’s fully melted. Use a spoon to mix your chocolate in between intervals. You’ll only need 1/4-1/3 cup of chocolate to make your chocolate garnish.
- Place your piping tip into a piping bag. Put the piping bag over the edges of a tall glass.
- Pour the melted chocolate into the piping bag.
- Cut the piping bag tip and twist the end of the piping bag to get it ready for piping.
- Place your parchment paper or silicone mat on a baking sheet. This will make it easier to transfer it to the freezer later. Any plate would work for this as well depending on how much freezer space you have.
- Begin piping your chocolate garnish.
- Place chocolate into the freezer for 20 minutes to set them.
- Do not hold the chocolate garnish decoration for a very long time in your hand or it will start to melt.
- Place your chocolate garnish gently into your cupcake.
