Sweet to the Core Fall Apple Party

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Now that Sep­tem­ber is upon us, I am SOOOO super excit­ed for Fall! Liv­ing in Las Vegas and expe­ri­enc­ing the high tem­per­a­tures of a desert Sum­mer makes you tru­ly look for­ward to the chang­ing of the sea­son. Though the offi­cial start of Autumn isn’t until the 23rd this year, as soon as the kids head back to school and Sep­tem­ber arrives, it already feels like Fall in my mind!

Anoth­er event that Sep­tem­ber brings in our fam­i­ly is my moth­er’s birth­day! I’ve shared sev­er­al of her past cel­e­bra­tions, includ­ing the Come Fly Away, Namaste Spa and Let Me Take You to Rio par­ties. This year, I want­ed to show her our appre­ci­a­tion of how sweet she is and all that she does for our entire fam­i­ly with a Sweet to the Core theme, per­fect for an Autumn theme!

Last year, we also did an apple motif with an Apple Cider and Bake Sale Stand, so I want­ed to make sure this par­ty had a more mature, sophis­ti­cat­ed, yet play­ful feel. Since the cup­cakes were to be the main focus {of course!}, I made M&M’s® Pecan Pie cup­cakes topped with adorable fon­dant apples and planned the rest of the table around them!  Scroll down to for inspi­ra­tion and tips for styling your own Sweet to the Core par­ty, find the recipe and tuto­r­i­al for the cup­cakes and enter the Bake in the Fun sweep­stakes for a chance to win a KitchenAid® mixer!!!

Fall Apple Par­ty Inspiration:

♥ Decor

Start off by deter­min­ing your over­all feel and col­ors. For a Fall-themed par­ty, rus­tic earth tones are per­fect­ly paired with reds and greens of apples. Burlap is the ide­al com­ple­ment due to the col­or and tex­ture and works per­fect­ly as a table cov­er. Uti­lize wood­en crates, bas­kets and bushels as decor that will dou­ble as dis­plays and aid in pro­vid­ing vary­ing heights to your table. Fab­rics in coor­di­nat­ing col­ors  and pat­terns can be used to make a sim­ple ban­ner {cut fab­ric into strips and tie them to a rope}, as well as addi­tion­al embell­ish­ments through­out the table. This is the per­fect time of year to search for Autumn and apple inspired adorn­ments, such as the dried flo­ral apple and wood­en cider buck­et. Paint wood apples with black chalk­board paint and uti­lize them as food labels, as well as the main sign writ­ten with a chalk­board pen for greater ease. Final­ly, tie up the pre­sen­ta­tion with some fresh or faux flow­ers in match­ing hues.

♥ Food and Drinks

Keep it sweet and sim­ple when it comes to food and drinks so guests can serve them­selves and you don’t have to wor­ry about keep­ing it all heat­ed. To accom­pa­ny the theme, make turkey, brie and apple sand­wich­es on cia­bat­ta bread, along with lat­tice chips and cute indi­vid­ual jars of Mot­t’s® Apple Sauce Orig­i­nal. Offer Snap­ple® Apple Sin­gle bot­tles that match­es both the theme and col­ors that can be con­sumed straight from the bot­tle or poured into mason jars with han­dles and paper straws.

♥ Dessert

For the most impor­tant part of every par­ty: dessert! Am I right?! Make the M&M’s® Pecan Pie cup­cakes the cen­ter of atten­tion by dis­play­ing them on col­ored cake stands in the cen­ter of your table. Accen­tu­ate your sweets with more good­ies, such as mini apple pies, sup­ple­men­tary Fall-themed M&M’s® in apple-shaped dish­es and red and green apples that will not only pro­vide addi­tion­al decor, but are edi­ble! Pro­vide dips for the apples, such as caramel or cream cheese.

You will find the step-by-step recipe for the cup­cakes and fon­dant top­pers below, but first, make sure to enter the #bakeinthe­funsweep­stakes!

MARS Bake In The Fun Sweepstakes 

For a one-stop shop to pur­chase all my ingre­di­ents, I head­ed to my local Wal­mart and found all the essen­tials to make the cen­ter­piece cup­cakes. But before you go, be sure to print out the the M&M’s® coupon to get $1 off any two choco­late can­dies! I’ll take any chance to save some money! 😉

M&M’s® Pecan Pie Cup­cake Recipe 

Ingre­di­ents:

♥ Pills­bury™ Moist Supreme® Clas­sic White cake mix

♥ Mot­t’s® Apple­sauce Original

♥ M&M’s® Pecan Pie 9.9oz bag

♥ 1 cup of water

♥ 3 eggs

♥ Pills­bury™ Creamy Supreme® Cream Cheese Icing

Pre­heat oven to 350* and pre­pare your muf­fin pan by insert­ing cup­cake lin­ers in each opening.

Add Pills­bury™ Moist Supreme® Clas­sic White cake mix, 3 eggs and 1 cup of water in a bowl. Replace the veg­etable oil with 1/2 cup of Mot­t’s® Apple­sauce Orig­i­nal and mix it togeth­er on medi­um speed for approx­i­mately 2–3 minutes.

Once mixed, gen­tly fold in 1 cup of  M&M’s® Pecan Pie into the bat­ter. Don’t wor­ry if the col­ors run a bit, as it sim­ply adds a bit of col­or to the cupcakes!

Scoop bat­ter into the pre­vi­ous­ly pre­pared cup­cake lin­ers in the muf­fin pan. As you are scoop­ing the bat­ter, make sure you are get­ting sev­er­al  M&M’s® Pecan Pie pieces in each one. Ordi­nar­i­ly, I fill the lin­ers 3/4 full, but due to the the M&M’s® Pecan Pie pieces, fill it a bit more than usual.

Bake the cup­cakes for approx­i­mately 10 min­utes or until you can insert a tooth­pick through the cen­ter and it comes out clean. Allow the cup­cakes to cool com­plete­ly, then ice them with Pills­bury™ Creamy Supreme® Cream Cheese Icing.

Fon­dant Apple Tutorial

Mate­ri­als Needed:

♥ Red, lime green, ivory and black fondant

♥ Water/edible glue and brush

♥ Fon­dant rolling pin and 1/8″ guide rings

♥ Small apple cutter

♥ Mini teardrop cutter

♥ Knife tool

♥ Mod­el­ing tool

♥ Round dec­o­rat­ing tip #7

♥ Pat­terned mboss­ing mat

♥ Veg­etable shortening

Step 1:

Roll out red {or lime green} fon­dant with the rolling pin and 1/8″ guide rings. Cut out an apple shape with the cutter.

Step 2:

With your fin­gers, flat­ten and stretch out the fon­dant apple a bit to enlarge it.

Step 3:

Roll out ivory fon­dant a bit thick and spread a bit of veg­etable short­en­ing over it. Place the emboss­ing mat over it and uti­lize the rolling pin with 1/8″ guide rings to impress the pat­tern on the fondant.

Step 4:

Uti­lize the apple cut­ter to punch out the shape. Fit it over the flat­tened red apple to make sure it fits prop­er­ly and adjust the red fon­dant as needed.

Step 5:

Uti­lize the mod­el­ing tool to make inden­ta­tions on the ivory apple for the seeds.

Step 6:

Roll out black fon­dant with the rolling pin and 1/8″ guide rings. Cut out two cir­cles with round dec­o­rat­ing tip #7. Roll each cir­cle into a ball, then shape it into a teardrop shape to cre­ate the apple seeds. Glue them inside the indents on the ivory apple.

Step 7:

Roll out lime green fon­dant with the rolling pin and 1/8″ guide rings. Cut out a mini teardrop with the cut­ter. Uti­lize the knife tool to make leaf inden­ta­tions, then shape it into a leaf.

Step 8:

Glue the ivory apple to the red flat­tened fon­dant, then fin­ish it off by glu­ing the leaf. Allow to dry thor­ough­ly pri­or to dec­o­rat­ing your cup­cakes. Repeat these steps to make green apples and accen­tu­ate your assort­ment with sim­ple red and green apples as well!

Do you have any favorite dish­es that are auto­mat­ic go-to’s for the crisp, cool weath­er?! Be sure to check out more recipes here for addi­tion­al ideas to serve at your Fall-inspired party!

Merci Beaucoup!

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