Cupcakes in a Jar

I promised a friend I'd make her some cupcakes for her birthday. The only problem is that she lives in another state so I wasn't sure how I was going to get them to her. After some research on the web, and some inspiration from Beantown Baker, I decided to try and ship them inside of a pint-size jar.

Baking the cupcake inside the jar makes it stationary and more likely to arrive intact. I put the batter into the jar without any wrappers, and baked them like I normally would if they were in a muffin pan. When they cooled, I filled them with homemade caramel and topped them with chocolate ganache.

I put them in the freezer overnight and then tied a ribbon and fork around the lid.

To keep the jars from breaking, I used a cupcake bakery box with dividers and slipped the jars into the holes. I filled the bottom of the bakery box with popcorn to provide a little extra cushion, and then taped up the box and placed it into my shipping box.

The bakery box fit snugly in the shipping box and I used extra cardboard on the top and bottom. FedEx did a great job getting them to my friend safely. They looked almost perfect when they arrived except for a few of the ribbons and forks had slipped off the lids. But most importantly the ganache and chocolate curls were still swirled on top.