I started by looking for the striped cupcake wrappers on Amazon. I chose the pack of baking cups from Paper Eskimo. They worked great! They’re super sturdy, and you just put them on a baking sheet — no muffin tin necessary. (Note: I’m not an Amazon affiliate, so don’t worry, I’m not making any money if you click on that link.)

I’m not a baker, so I used a Pillsbury cake mix. It was “Yellow” flavor, whatever that is. How is yellow a flavor? Anyway, I chose that because 1) there was a box of it in the cupboard, and 2) the light color would look better in the cupcake liners. I filled the liners half way with cake batter. When done, the cake rose to about a half inch below the rim. Perfect amount of space to put the “popcorn.”

The “popcorn” for the cupcakes is actually mini marshmallows. To adhere them to the top of the cupcakes, I used Betty Crocker Cookie Icing, which is in the supermarket baking aisle. I like cookie icing because it hardens and acts just like glue — and it’s yummy. (I chose the white color.) I put a dab of icing on each mini marshmallow, and then pressed it down onto the cupcake. To build height, I just stacked them, using cookie icing on each marshmallow.

Cute, right? But something was still missing. And that something was a little bit of yellow. You know how real popcorn has the yellow part of the kernel? We needed that for these popcorn cupcakes. My solution was jellybeans. I cut yellow jelly beans in half and attached three pieces to the mound of marshmallows, again using cookie icing. 

These would make great treats for a movie night, a circus party, even a baseball party. Which makes them an Oscar-worthy idea.