I found myself up until 2:00 this morning putting the finishing touches on the much anticipated Lighting McQueen cake in celebration of Titus's 3rd Birthday! As always, it was a long daunting process full of "learning opportunities". So now I have a Strawberry Shortcake, a Blue's Clues, 2 John Deere Tractors (one was pink), a Princess Belle cake, a Cinderella cake and a Lightning McQueen cake under my belt. I have done others too, but these are the character cakes that I've done.
It seems like each one takes longer than I anticipated and runs into some sort of catastrophe before turning out okay in the end. This year I learned that it takes a boat load of red to turn white frosting into a deep red. I ended up using 1.5 ounces of Wilton cake decorating food coloring, and 3 full tubes of regular food coloring, adding some Wilton brown to try to tone down the awful pink color I kept getting. In the end it turned out okay because I also found out that red darkens as it sits. I almost cried at the thought of all of that effort for a pink Lightning McQueen cake!
What I didn't know until I hopped on-line to try to figure out how to get a deep red, is that when you use that much food coloring it makes the frosting taste bitter unless you get the no-taste red (would have been good to know before it was too late to go get some). So, I added some almond flavoring to try to mask the bitterness, but honestly, I'm not holding out hope for this to be one of my best tasting cakes! Hey, you learn as you go right?
I also made a huge mess! This was even after cleaning up some as I went along. Notice my lap top, I watched some Super Nanny on-line to help pass the time while I was making a mess... I mean... decorating. I go through tons of paper towels for some reason... and lots of tooth picks too. Oh yeah, and spoons and bowls!
It seems like each one takes longer than I anticipated and runs into some sort of catastrophe before turning out okay in the end. This year I learned that it takes a boat load of red to turn white frosting into a deep red. I ended up using 1.5 ounces of Wilton cake decorating food coloring, and 3 full tubes of regular food coloring, adding some Wilton brown to try to tone down the awful pink color I kept getting. In the end it turned out okay because I also found out that red darkens as it sits. I almost cried at the thought of all of that effort for a pink Lightning McQueen cake!
What I didn't know until I hopped on-line to try to figure out how to get a deep red, is that when you use that much food coloring it makes the frosting taste bitter unless you get the no-taste red (would have been good to know before it was too late to go get some). So, I added some almond flavoring to try to mask the bitterness, but honestly, I'm not holding out hope for this to be one of my best tasting cakes! Hey, you learn as you go right?
I also made a huge mess! This was even after cleaning up some as I went along. Notice my lap top, I watched some Super Nanny on-line to help pass the time while I was making a mess... I mean... decorating. I go through tons of paper towels for some reason... and lots of tooth picks too. Oh yeah, and spoons and bowls!
This is how I left my kitchen counters last night, I was just too tired to clean up at that point. Here's one of my tricks by the way: I buy store bought frosting then add some powdered sugar to it to thicken it up. And if you need brown or black, just add those colors to chocolate frosting so you can get it a nice deep color.
More mess!
And here's the finished product! Well, almost finished, I added a black line to his mouth and some writing beneath the cake later, but here's the mostly finished product for now. Ka-Chow, Ka-Pow!
6 comments:
Another baking success babe!
You are totally amazing. I can't imagine coming even one bit close to that masterpiece.
So.... I'm curious how you keep it fresh or covered until the big unveiling and eating of the cake. What's the trick?
Looks delcious Robyn! Your kidos sure are blessed to have such a wonderful and talented mama! Happy Birthday Titus!
Very well done! Isn't crazy the effort we moms put into something that is just going to be eaten. All to make our kids happy.
Becca,
I actually just leave it out on the counter because I like the taste of the frosting kind of dry. You could always cover it with a cake traveller, but I don't have one yet. It's on my list!
Oh, and I unveil it in the morning and let the kids oh and ah over it in anticipation of their party!
It was a great cake! You forgot to add the Thomas cake to your list.
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