From J:
Some of you have heard about this. Heck, all of you have heard about this and have probably seen a photo of it by now. For A's birthday this year, I made her a cake. And NOT JUST ANY CAKE. This cake is a masterpiece of fondant and icing, colored to perfection as a perfect replica of a famous United States landmark! I give you...the Pensacola Beach sign from Gulf Breeze, A's hometown.
What, you were expecting the Statue of Liberty, or something? Actually, I should have done the Washington Monument. That would have been pretty easy. Anyway, A has a replica of this on her desk at work that lights up, so I figured that she would also like a replica made out of cake that she could eat.
How does one go about making something like this out of cake? First, bake some cakes (I made chocolate). This is easy. Follow the directions on the box. I specifically followed the "low fat" directions which calls for applesauce instead of oil and less water. Tastes fine.
Now, on to the fancy stuff.
I scaled and printed out the above picture to use as a template. Then, I made some fondant to give the cake clean lines and a paintable surface. I also cut letters out of the fondant. To make fondant, mix: 1) 8oz of marshmallows and 2) 2 Tbsp of water. Nuke it in the microwave until the marshmallows fluff up, then stir them with a spoon sprayed with nonstick spray. Oh, and spray the bowl before you add in the marshmallows. After stirring, you can add some color.
Now, add in confectioner's sugar until it isn't sticky any longer. This takes a very large amount of confectioner's sugar. Oh, and it's sticky.
Keep your work surface well covered in sugar to prevent sticking. After adding in enough sugar, it turns in to a dough-like substance that can be rolled. I made three batches of fondant: yellow, white, and red (came out pink - coloring is a bit of an art). This fondant has the advantage of being very, very tasty. I mean, it's marshmallows and sugar. Of course it's going to taste good.
Now, I used the aforementioned template to cut out the sign. Each piece was covered in a thin layer of chocolate icing to make the fondant stick.
The letters were the toughest part. I used the same technique one uses when carving a pumpkin, using a pushpin to trace the outline of what you're cutting with dots. It worked pretty well.
I then cut out the letters using a paring knife. This was not easy.
A single piece of fondant , yo.
I wet the base fondant very slightly so that it would become sticky again to attach the writing. The sign, post-fondanting:
Now, I worked on the fish. Same principle, use the photo as a template and ice, then fondant. The iced version:
After fondanting, I used gel coloring and a fine paint brush to do all of the colors. The end result!
A loved it. In fact, I've gotten more praise for doing this cake than I have for anything else in recent memory. Does this tell me something about my path in life? I think that fancy cakes are going to become a tradition around here, because this was actually pretty fun to do. Total cost: $10. Time invested, including setup and cleanup: 6 hours.
This weekend, J's parents came to visit us. We had a nice weekend, complete with a visit to Kanapaha Botanical Gardens. Here is a picture of the bridge over the koi pond, along with some very large lilypads:
On our way to have a picnic overlooking Lake Kanapaha, we saw some beautiful little lilypads and flowers:
We also saw a Jabba the Hut caterpillar munching on leaves:
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