My cousin’s daughter just turned one and they were throwing a Horton Hears a Who party. My cousin approached my and asked me if I could make a Horton Hears a Who cake (elephant cake) for the party. I love to bake and usually make the cakes for friends and family’s parties. My cousin had seen a few ideas on this website and sent them to me. I absolutely loved this cake and it was a hit at the birthday party!!
Horton’s Body:
Make two 9×13 cakes; I used a white cake mix.
Stack the cakes once cooled. While cake is sitting horizontal, cut off 1/3 of the end of the entire cake. From the piece that was cut away, cut four sections from the top cake to be used for Horton’s feet. Save the rest to be used to make Horton’s trunk. I carved the rest of the cake freehand to resemble Horton’s body.
Horton’s Head:
Bake a cake in half of a Sports Ball Pan; this will be Horton’s head. Turn cake dome side up and place up against the body portion of the cake. I cut the shape of Horton’s ears out of poster board, iced them the same blue color used for his body and attached them to Horton’s head using dowel rods.
Horton’s Trunk:
Take the pieces of cake that were cut from the body section and form into a “u” shape off the front of Horton’s head.
Horton’s Tail and Hair:
For the tail, I made marshmallow fondant and died it the blue color and then used black icing to color the end of the tail. For the hair, I used black shoe string licorice and stuck it into the top of his head.
Icing:
I used a blue food coloring and mixed it with white icing until I achieved the light blue color of Horton. I iced everything with this color. You will need to add extra icing to sculpt where the head and trunk meet.
Horton’s Details:
I used black icing gel to draw Horton’s eyes, the marks on his trunk, mouth and ears.
Horton’s Clover:
I baked a mini cupcake and used pink food coloring to dye the coconut for the top.
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This really is the coolest cake I have ever seen. I’ve been looking around for places that make Horton cakes for my birthday and haven’t had any luck. One of my friends saw this one online and told me about it. When I read the reason for you making this cake I laughed because it was for a one year old and I’m going to be eighteen and am going to try to make it, i doubt its going to look as good as yours but I’m really excited to try. I wanted to say thanks for posting your directions. I cant wait to make it!
You gave great directions and I was able to make this for my daughter for her 4th birthday! It came out great! Thanks for posting this!
I’m SO excited that you’ve posted this on here. I’ve loved this website for other cakes and haven’t been able to find anything ‘Horton’ related anywhere else that I like. My daughter is turning 3 soon and I’m excited to give this a try!!
Thank you all for your great feedback! I loved hearing how everyone has enjoyed this cake. This was a difficult cake to make directly from the Horton book, but I was very pleased with it! Thanks everyone and happy baking!!
This is the only Horton cake I’ve been able to find. My son is on the autistic spectrum. Even though he is turning 12 in his mind he is more like 8. He loves Horton and wants a Horton cake for his birthday. This is perfect! It is the only one I could find too. I am so excited to show this to him. Thank you for the post.
My son had his heart set on the Horton Hears a Who theme for his 4th birthday party coming up. All of the supplies are sold out everywhere, so we had to buy the tablecloth, blow outs, and hats, and then coordinate with that. I needed a Horton cake. The lady that usually does my cakes wanted almost a hundred dollars to make this one. I decided to give it a try with all of the bad weather days we’ve been having and have been stuck in the house anyway. So, I DID IT! It looks great! It could use a little touching up, but I am really proud of it and my son is in love with me even more now after making it for practice. I just had some problems with the ears. What kind of icing should I use? I made buttercream. Also, should I make the ears ahead of time and let them get hard? Do I glue the dowels on? I think that is all of the questions I have. Very cool idea!
I want to see the tail. Can you send me a tail pict?
I actually just cut poster board and iced it with a very thin buttercream icing. You could also just use the whipped store bought stuff. It may not weigh the poster board down so much. If I remade it at this point having much more experience, I would just color fondant and cut them out and attache with wire or other support/adhesive. Let me know if you have any questions and I am so glad you found the instructions helpful!
Would you please email a picture of the tail
Your directions were awesome I am totally not a creative person and this cake turned out wonderful. I did a test run last week and the final cake will be done on Friday. yea … but please need to see the tail.
Thank You so very much,
Kim
Just wanted to chime in on all the love and thank you for posting the directions for this awesome cake that I will be making for my soon to be 5 year old that loves elephants!!