I was assigned to make a cake for a dear friend’s daughter’s 5th birthday. Since my ideas are greater than my ability I came up with a cake that looked like a book with a castle on top. I thought that would be perfect for this little fairy tale princess. I forgot the most important thing. My idea was greater than my ability. Yet, once I mentioned the idea and everyone in earshot gushed so I was left with figuring out how to achieve this lofty goal. I have never taken a cake decorating class but I have watched Cake Boss. Would that be enough?
First problem: I cannot write on a cake. Well, I really cannot decorate at all other than just winging it. However, writing letters is especially hard for me. A friend reminded me of edible paper you can put in your printer after I finished the cake. At any rate, my solution was fondant. Thankfully this was for a child since the letters had a modeling clay flair to them.
Second problem: I have never made a book cake. So, I simply double layered an 11×15 sheet cake and carved the edges to appear to be a cake. I also carved a “v” in the center and applied a fondant book mark to give the appearance of a book.
I have experience making a castle cake so I applied the same principles to my mini castle on the top of the cake. Since ice cream cones were too big to serve as pillars fondant rode in on a white horse to save the day once again.
The cake of the castle was white with a purple swirl. The book cake was one layer of chocolate fudge and one layer of white chocolate which I colored purple.
Final problem: I forgot to get flags at the cake store and could not get there to pick some up. So, I made my own using Microsoft Publisher and lollipop sticks. As it turns out that was more fun than buying some and very easy! I think I will do that from now on.
As things began to come together and I found solutions for my problems I had a blast. As it turned out this cake is very easy to make. The little girl loved her special fairy tale book cake and so did everyone else. So, take it from me, if I can do it so can you. In fact, you will probably do it better. So, for your child’s next birthday make a fairy tale book cake. If you blog about please submit the link in the comments for me to see!