Southerner in the City: Becky's Last Night in Georgia

All Becky's College Gear

It's sad to admit that my summer's coming to an end. Tomorrow, Becky leaves her tiny room where

she's lived for 18 years, and I make the trek to Manhattan on Thursday. Half our living room is covered with rubbermaid boxes filled with everything from clothes to cleaning supplies. So for our "Last Supper" as a full family until Thanksgiving, we had a special dinner. Tacos with all the fixings were the main entree, and for dessert, I baked delicious Jungle Fever cupcakes.

The nine hippos were my first treat tryouts of the day.

Ingredients-

9 funfetti cupcakes baked in blue paper liners
1/2 cup white sugar
1 can vanilla frosting
blue food coloring
9 peanut butter sandwich cookies (Nutter Butter)
9 chocolate-covered coffee beans
36 orange gourmet mints

1) Place the sugar in a small shallow bowl. Tint the sugar blue with food coloring.

All the Ingredients

2) Spoon 2 tablespoons of the vanilla frosting into a small ziplock bag, press out the excess air, seal, and set aside. Tint the remaining vanilla frosting blue with the food coloring. Spread the blue frosting on top of the cupcakes and smooth. Roll the edge of the cupcakes in the sugar--hold the bowl at an angle and gently roll the edge in the blue sugar.
3) For the hippo's head, press the cookie into the frosting of each cupcake, allowing 1/3 of the cookie to hang over the edge. Snip a small (1/8-inch) corner from the bag with the vanilla frosting. Pipe dots of the frosting onto the peanut butter cookie for the eyes, nostrils, and ears. Cut the chocolate-covered coffee beans in half using a sharp knife. Attach the chocolate-covered coffee beans, round side up, to the frosting to make the eyes and attach the gourmet mints to make the ears and nose.

The gators were a little harder to make, but for my University of Florida sister, it was a must.

Ingredients-

9 vanilla cupcakes baked in blue paper liners
1 can vanilla frosting
1/2 cup white sugar
9 peanut butter sandwich cookies (Nutter Butter)
9 green jordan almonds
9 chocolate-covered coffee beans

1) Spoon 1/2 cup of vanilla frosting into a ziplock bag, press out the excess air, seal, and set aside. If you still have blue tinted frosting from the hippo cupcakes, spread it on top of the cupcakes. Then tint the can of vanilla frosting green with the food coloring. If not, divide the frosting into 2 bowls; tint one bowl green and the other blue. Spread the blue on top of the cupcake.
2) You should still have blue tinted sugar remaining from your hippos cupcakes, so there's no reason to scoop out more. Simply roll the edge of the cupcakes in sugar.
3) For the croc heads, trim the edges of the cookies with a serrated knife to form a long V-shape. Ice the cookies with the green frosting. To make your gator shiny, add green food coloring drops to the blue sugar. Then press the frosted cookie into the green sugar, covering completely. Attach the sugared cookie to the frosted cupcakes, sugar side up, allowing 1/3 of the cookie to hang over the edge.
4) For the eyes, place the green jordan almond at the gator's crown. Cut the chocolate-covered coffee beans in half. Pipe 2 dots of vanilla frosting on the jordan almond and attach the chocolate-covered coffee beans. Pipe nostril holes at the base and teeth on the outer edges of the head, starting at the top edge of the cookie, with the remaining vanilla frosting.

My Finished Product

With Becky heading to UF in the morning, that also means we're going to lose our GO GATORS blocks. They're sat on our mantel all summer long. It's become a bit of a game; we try to see who can come up with the most creative comebacks only using the eight letters.