Easiest way to decorate cakes / fairy cakes

[TweeterandtheMonkeyman]

10 year old loves baking at the moment (and has little else to do poor sod !) I’ve imparted my wisdom such as it is and she can knock out a decent batch of cup cakes / a sponge cake / biscuits. However, while I have always been able to bake things which taste nice - my decoration skills are crap , drippy icing is the best I can manage . Any ideas for decorations that look effective, that a 10 year old can manage . (I suspect her piping skills will be on a similar level to mine - messy!)

Simple buttercream icing. Mix butter and icing sugar to the consistency you like. It's really nice plain or you can add some peanut butter or Nutella when you mix.

I can't stand the drippy icing or royal icing which you roll out. Buttercream icing is best. If you have a look online you can also find versions with cream cheese added which is like the icing on carrot cake 🧁

Oh, and you can pipe the buttercream icing on and get all fancy but it's just as good smoothed on with a knife or fork.

I think you can whip (with an electric whisk) some double cream, a little sugar and cornstarch to make stabilised cream which will hold its shape and stay good in the fridge for a day or too but I've yet to try this.

You can practise piping repeatedly on a plate, filling up the bag with all the used icing to try again. You can create easy effects with flower nozzles and I bet there are a ton of YouTube tutorials she’d enjoy. Make the icing quite thick/stiff so it doesn’t melt/flop.

Sieve and icing sugar! Not boring if you call it snow or something!

Chocolate buttons.

Take the cakes out of the oven and put a chocolate button on each, by the time you have got to the last one the first will have begun to melt, put your finger on the button and make little circles, the chocolate melts, if you want to cover more than the centre use more buttons.

I'd say give piping a go, it isn't as hard as you might be imagining. Doing a big swirl is pretty easy. We've got an icing bag coupler which allows you to pipe from three bags with different icing colour to make a rainbow swirl and it's easy and looks great.

Edible glitter spray is a hit here. Kitchen is covered in the bloody stuff mind

I second buttercream with a piping bag and nozzle. It's easy to do and lots of fun!

Great suggestions, thanks. I like the chocolate button idea @sashh 😄
I can do buttercream! Just never looks that great when I put it on the cake . I think I’ll order a piping bag and some other bits & see if we can both improve our skills 😂

Butter cream.
Drippy icing and sprinkles.
Butterfly cakes (cut top off, blob of jam and stick them back on to make wings).
Chocolate chip fairy cakes don't need decorating!

Smarties or buttons
Broken bits of a flake are surprisingly effective.

Put a large marshmallow on top of each cupcake and stick them under the grill for a minute or so until they melt. So easy, and a nice marshmallow topping for the cake. You can then add sprinkles if you like, for extra effect.

Amazing ! Love the flake idea, love the chocolate chip idea!