Paintball Cake

The paintball cake gave me another chance to try moulding different coloured fondants together to get a design like camouflage. The first time I tried this technique was for the Mulberry handbag cake which was covered in leopard print fondant and was more difficult to do because of the larger area to cover.

I had fun making the figures as I got to splatter them with yellow and blue fondant to make it look like paint spots. The figures were the only none edible part on the cake as I used a cocktail stick for the paintball guns and put one inside each of the figures to help keep them stable.

The boulders and tree trunk were made with rice crispies and chocolate then covered in grey fondant for the boulders and brown for the tree trunk.

With the cake being for children I wanted to keep the fondant to a minimum, so the top of the cake was covered in green vanilla butter cream which was piped on to give a grass effect. To keep the figures from going mussy from the butter cream I used some of the crumbs from the rice crispies to make it look like the grass had been trodden away.

The trees around the outside of the cake were made with green fondant cut out tree shapes (two for each tree) and then stuck either side of a mint matchstick. To keep them in place I used some of the left over icing.

I was really pleased with the finished cake even with the few minor glitches like the nose falling of the blond haired figure a couple of minutes before it was picked up, thankfully I had some edible glue handy. But other than that it went well.

The Hair Salon Cake

The Hair Salon cake was a gift to a hairdresser who was retiring. The cake is based on her salon, so the wallpaper backdrop is similar to the wallpaper in the salon and the two drier hoods are too. The lady putting curlers in is meant to be the lady who retired and the lady in the chair is a customer. The rest of the objects on the cake are just pieces that are usually found in a salon like a can of hairspray, comb, mirror, hair drier and the obligatory pile of magazines (they were one of my favourite bits).


It was one of the biggest cake challenges I've had so far mainly because of the tiny objects to make and trying to pick the best section of the salon to create. The backdrop was difficult, I needed to find a way to make a sheet that was strong enough to stand up but that could still be edible so I went for a sheet of rice crispies covered in chocolate, which was then cooled over night and covered in fondant the next day. To get the flower effect I have sheets that when rolled over fondant imprint a picture, this gave me the perfect template to paint on using the edible colour dusts. The day before the cake was due to be finished I had a worry on that the wallpaper might fall over and break so I rolled out sheets of sugar paste and let them dry, however they didn't dry in time and thankfully the rice crispies held together.


Most of the items on the cake were edible, the two figures, the chair and the drier hoods (except the seat under them) weren't. The cupboard unit was a section of cake dirty iced and covered in brown fondant and decorated with a pot plant and a pile of magazines. The cake itself was a vanilla sponge with a layer of vanilla icing and then covered in brown fondant which I later put lines running through it to create a wooden floor effect.

I was really pleased with the finished cake as I put a lot of time and effort into making it look like a real salon I heard from the lady who order the cake that everyone loved it and it tasted yummy which is the main thing.

Moshling Cake

Moshlings are the new big thing for children aged 6 to 10 or so I've been told. I personally had never heard of them until I was asked to make a cake in the style of a moshi monster.

The cake was for 7 year old Erin who had requested a moshling cake for her birthday, her favourite character is Poppet who is pink, wears blue trainers and I think is a cat. Originally I was going to design a Hello Kitty cake as I'd been told that that was the in thing for a 7 year old girl but it wasn't much of a change in colour or shape when asked to do Poppet instead.

The cake is a chocolate madeira cake with chocolate chips through the mixture and two layers of chocolate butter cream to keep the cake moist. The bulk of the cake is covered in hot pink fondant and I used baby pink, white and turquoise to create the character. I think the only fiddly bit was getting the fondant smooth over the cut out sections in the sponge but other than that it looked like the picture I was given.

Christmas Cakes Special

The first Christmas cake was a present to my dad. Its a whisky soaked fruit cake covered in marzipan and white regal ice and decorated with stockings, gingerbread men and reindeer around the edge and Santa Clause and the Snowman on top with a small Forest. The stockings idea came from the '1000 Ways to Decorate Cakes' book which I regularly look at for ideas and inspiration, it doesn't show you how to make the decorations just pictures of finished cakes but it is a really good book to have.
The rest of the decoration came from my noggin. Santa and the Snowman can be eaten but will last a while if dad decides to keep them.

Christmas Cake Pops

Since making the Halloween Cake Pops I've been dieing to make more so I thought as a gift for my Grandad and friend Jessica I would create some Christmas themed cake pops. I chose simple characters as time was limited so I went for the snowman, reindeer and Christmas puds.

The cake pop mixture was chocolate cake and chocolate butter cream so all I had to do for the puds was melt some white chocolate and pour a bit on top then once dried add holly and berries.

The snowman was next to be hit with white chocolate, this time I coated the body first then stuck the head on and covered that after. Once dried I added black spots for coal using royal icing and a fondant orange nose.

The last one was the reindeer, he was coated like the snowman but in milk chocolate and left to dry, during that time I used a tree cutter to make antlers and left them to harden so I could stick them on later. The belly was made with a heart cutter in teddy bear brown and white fondant for the eyes and red for the nose.

I really liked the Christmas Cake Pops they had a very festive look to them and make you smile when you look at them, well it does me.

Patchwork Christmas Cake

This wasn't made with fruit cake as the person who ordered it doesn't like fruit cake and doesn't like marzipan either.

It is a replicate (pretty much) of the Christmas Cake I made last year (2010) for my dad and it had court her eye while looking through my cake catalogue and she really wanted one for her family at Christmas but to be made with chocolate Madeira cake instead of fruit. I put a double layer of chocolate butter cream in to keep it moist, I don't think there's anything different from the first cake except colour so for more information on how I made it go to last years Christmas post to find out.

Snowman Christmas Cake

This cake was for my grandma who asked for a Christmas cake with not much fondant on but marzipan on top, so I thought it would be a good idea to make a pattern with the snowflakes that were made out of white fondant and linked together. It was the best way to keep the fondant to a minimum but to still have a pretty design. The snowman was to add a bit of fun to the cake and can be eaten or kept, the ribbon around the cake was to add a bit of colour.

Santa and Snowmen Christmas Cake

The snowman Christmas Cake used the patchwork cutters again, I really like the effect they give to a cake it can build up a scene in no time at all depending on the cutters used.

For this cake I used the two snowmen who are decorating the Christmas tree as Santa falls over in the snow. Around the edge are snowflakes in white fondant and I added a bit of glitter to both the snowflakes and the snow on top.

The Cake is a whisky soaked fruit cake and covered with marzipan and light blue regal ice.

Retirement Cake

The retirement cake was for the Head Mistress at Myton Park Primary School. The cake was vanilla Madeira cake with vanilla butter cream and decorated in burgundy and white regal ice. The design on top of the cake is the Myton Park emblem, this I had to cut out free-hand as I don't have any leaf cutters like the one on the emblem and the writing was piped on with royal icing.