I made this Homemade Swamp People Birthday Cake for the son of one of my husband’s coworkers – he loves the show Swamp People. I started several days ahead of time making the leaves, dragon fly, and cats tails out of marshmallow fondant- it is very humid in Louisiana and fondant does not like to stiffen up here so I made sure that they had plenty of time to dry. The cats tails are held up with angel hair pasta.
The day before the party I made the logs out of crispy treat, covered them in marshmallow fondant and painted on the wood grain. I used a wet Q-tip and brown gel food coloring to get a natural wood grain look. I may or may not have turned their teeth colors with this one- but it looked good! I also made the top of his head and legs out of rice crispy treat- after several failed attempts to carve them out of cake, and let them sit overnight to firm up. The swamp water is actually crinkled up tinfoil covering cardboard, I would suggest using something more sturdy than I did- this cake is super heavy when its done. I used a pastry brush to thinly cover the foil with piping gel tinted just slightly blue to give the impression that there is water under the moss, then sprinkled crushed rice crispy cereal randomly around the water and on the logs. I used Wiltons green Color Mist to get the moss good and bright green- letting it overspray up the logs a little to make it look more natural.
Then it was time for the gator. The body of the gator, and bottom jaw are chocolate cake made in large loaf pans and carved down. I used buttercream icing to crumb coat and hold his head to his body, then covered it in a tan marshmallow fondant. The spikes on his back are small lumps of rice crispy treat pressed into the fondant so that they didn’t move. I used a second layer of much darker fondant to cover the legs, the top of his head and back. Once I had him together I positioned him on the log. I used Wiltons Color Mist in black, green, and yellow to shade the alligator. Added feet, eyes and teeth (marshmallow fondant) and I had a Swamp People Birthday Cake!
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AWESOME, the best cake on this site!
This cake looks way too hard for the average cake maker! But it looks GREAT!!! This must have taken a LONG time…yes?
It actually wasn’t as hard as it looks. I am not in any way a proffesional, no training or anything like that, just a bored chick in my kitchen lol. I made the rice crispie parts one day and did the rest the second day- it did take me ALL day but really it wasnt bad. This was my first animal, and it was very cartoon like until I got the coloring just rite- I think thats the trick, the coloring. Ive done this cake twice, second time wasnt quite as realistic but pretty close
I love your cake. What did you make the moss out of?
Thank you :) I put rice crispie in a zip lock bag and rolled over it with a rolling pin a few times to break it up. I tried adding food coloring and shaking it up to color it, but that was a huge fail lol so i just sprayed it down with green wilton spray after I got it on the cake. I went pretty heavy on the moss, the swamp really does have alot of it- but mostly I was trying to hide the board as best I could
THIS CAKE IS REALLY GREAT. HOPE TO TRY FOR MY GRANDSONS NEXT BIRTHDAY. YOUR PICTURE SHOULD BE A LOT BIGGER SO WE CAN SEE THE DETILL BETTAI