broken glass cupcakes

In New York, needless to say, Halloween is a big thing.  Its even more than a big thing, it is a feeling that settles over the buildings and tree tops and just blankets the whole city in creativity, haunting and pumpkin spice.  I think maybe the most fun thing about Halloween in the city is for the whole month of October on whatever subway you are riding you will be sitting next to someone in a crazy costume.  Some you will make a mental note to copy next year, others you will spend the whole ride trying to figure out what the heck they are.  But it makes everyday thrilling.  And then, on the 31st all of Greenwich Village becomes a mass of organized chaos and the parade throbs through the streets, pushing you in and out as a by stander and participant.  The year my friend Jane and I went as Absinthe Fairies* (not Tinker Bells damnit!) was my favorite Halloween ever, we bar bounced after parading and just had a perfect NY Halloween, it wasn’t crazy cold, the streets smelled like beer, we looked sparkly, the sky felt light as we walked around downtown and then crawled onto the L to crash at my place. 

To capture that mix of magic and grittiness, the recipe I have turned to for about 9 years now, is my broken glass cupcakes.  Martha Stewart had them in her magazine one year and I ripped it out and haven’t looked back.  It’s a classic that shows cupcakes aren’t always about being cute, these have an edge and a kind of gutter beauty that makes them perfect for Halloween.  Broken glass never tasted so good!

These toppers can be slipped into any cupcakes you can dream up- but i find the flatter the frosting the more effective.  Also, the red food coloring drizzle (you could also use jam) makes them a real gore-fest.  Its so easy, but so effective, these cupcakes really put people on edge until they chomp down on the glass and taste how sweet it is!   If you are piercing a macaron, use the point to kind of chisel a hole for the glass to go into or you might shatter your macaron shell.

These cupcakes, which take something that should be comforting and turn it on its head with something scary, that actually is something sweet (it’s a lot going on in a little cupcake!) reminds me in theme of the Shining.  A dad who should be a protector goes nuts, the bright white snow becomes scarier than a dark creepy forest and cute, well dressed twins get a really bad rap. Have you ever lived with someone who every now and then you just checked what they were typing just to make sure they weren’t writing “all work and no play makes jack a very dull boy?”  No, yeah, lol me neither for sure…cause that would be totally crazy….anywho, it’s a great movie for the first nights below freezing and these cupcakes with some red rum wine.

*I was reminded of this single girl Halloween costume while at the pumpkin patch with my two boys.  The car parked next to us was filled with 20-something hippie types that are so Oregon I’m pretty sure if anyone ever won the Oregon Trail computer game the prize was literally a picture of one of these modern hippies on the screen- Congrats, you survived the Oregon Trail, here is what your decedents will look like!  I’m not sure, since in my class we always all died of dysentery before winning the game, but I like to imagine this is true.   But anyways, as they lounged next to their hand painted car without a care in the world, one girl stood up and said, “did anyone bring the abstinence?” They and I all looked at her like “what the?” and then she added, “you know abstinence, that green drink?”  I continued to buckle my kids into my minivan thinking youth truly is wasted on the young.