I used to make special birthday cakes for my three children when they were growing up. My son remembers the cakes fondly and told his wife that he wanted his son to have that experience. My daughter-in-law asked me to continue the tradition by making her son’s birthday cakes.
Last year, I made a monkey cake. That was pretty easy as I made one that was on the Martha Stewart website. This year I was asked to make a Nemo cake. I had no Nemo Birthday Cake Idea to do until I found your website. I was inspired by a cake I saw here. I have never done fondant so didn’t want to try that. Also, fondant doesn’t really taste that good. I decided to use frosting. I saw on one website that to make a fish cake, use a football cake pan. I didn’t have one so I made a football pattern and then added Nemo’s tail and fins.
I made three 9×13 cakes. I cut two footballs out of two of the cakes and the fins and tail out of the other one. I put chocolate frosting between the two football cakes and stacked them like a layer cake. I put the fins and tail on the football layers and shaped the football to look like a fish. I crumb coated it and then frosted it starting from the nose and going down towards the tail. I didn’t want to pipe so used licorice for the black lines. I found licorice wheels at Sweet Factory. They are double licorice ropes rolled up. I unrolled them and used them double for the edges of the tail and fins and single for the rest of the cake including the mouth. Because they were rolled up, the licorice for the eye was already curved which made for a nice round eye. I cut the ends of the eye licorice on an angle and they went together very well.
One of the cakes on your website had used a Jr. Mint for the center of the eye which I did. Also, they had used a graham cracker for the little fin which I did as well. I was very satisfied with the results and the cake was a hit. We hated to cut him up.
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Where this is great, I can’t believe how much extra time some people have! You must be retired.
I love the idea of the licorice. I keep envisioning myself ruining a perfectly good cake with sloppy black lines and plan on stealing your licorice idea. Thanks for mentioning the graham cracker and junior mint as well. Great ideas. Excellent job! My future 3 year old will love this.