Sunday, October 9, 2016

whale birthday cake


For the past few years I've been making celebration cakes for my friend Irene, including her baby shower cake, her baby's first birthday cake (a smash cake and a tiered cake for her guests, as well as Korean Hanbok cookies!), and now, a cake for her baby's second birthday!

It's pretty much tradition that I made her a nectarine and cream cake (it all started with her baby shower cake!), but this time she wanted a strawberry and banana cake for baby! She wanted a whale cake to go with the nautical theme, and then I would make a second larger cake for the guests (which would be a nectarine and cream cake, of course!)


Somehow I forgot to take pictures of the cake and the filling, but you'll have to trust me when I tell you that I made two 6-inch vanilla cakes (recipe in my book!), sliced them in half horizontally to give me four layers, and then filled each layer with freshly whipped cream and sliced strawberries and bananas. Then I whipped up a batch up buttercream, tinted it sky blue, and did a quick crumb coat with it before smoothing it out, chilled it in the fridge, and then doing a final smooth coat on top.


Then it was time to add the whale details! A few days previously, I had made some fondant pieces to decorate with - the white ribbed piece for the whale belly ...


... two round pink circles for cheeks ...


and then I piped the eyes and mouth using black frosting with a small round tip.


Next I added two blue fondant whale flippers, and the final touch was fondant pieces for the water coming out of the whale's spout!



Now, I had modeled the cake after a picture of a whale cake that Irene had sent me, but after I was done I wasn't sure if it was fully apparent that this was supposed to be a whale. In fact, after I was done assembling my cake, my 8-year old son walked by and asked, "What is that? Why does it have a beard?"

Hmmmmm...


Anyway, Irene did a fantastic job with the food and decorations for the party! Everything was beautiful and delicious! Too bad the whale cake melted in the hot sun though! Aaack! By the time it was time to cut the cake, the whale looked like it had bangs made out of a wave of frosting! (I'm so sorry, Irene!)

Happy Happy Birthday, Aaron!

4 comments:

  1. Hai, wanna to ask the cake is safe to put back to the fridge after all the fondant topper added?

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    Replies
    1. @Thea - i usually add my fondant toppers the morning that the cake is due, so at the most it will be in the fridge for no more than an hour or so. i have not tried having fondant in the fridge overnight, but i did read somewhere that from the humidity in the fridge the fondant could get sticky and wet.

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  2. Hi! It is adorable! May we ask -- how do you get the fins to stay? And the spout? Thank you!

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