Original and Unique Birthday Cakes

My son wanted to have his 4th birthday at “the tunnels” – a local attraction, Inner Space Caverns near Austin. We took the kids on the tour of the limestone cavern, giving each child a spelunker’s helmet.

I love to decorate cakes, so I first made a chocolate bundt cake which I then cut in half and shifted to form more of an “S” shape. I iced the matching ends to stick them together, and then iced the rest of the cake with cream cheese icing. On the top I sprinkled Ovaltine chocolate powder to look like dirt, and sprinkled more around the base.

I made meringue cookies with mini chocolate chips and put them around the outside to look like rocks/boulders, and edged the cavern with green icing and sprinkles to look like patches of flowers.

Finally, I made a sign pointing to the “entrance” out of half of a bamboo skewer, construction paper, and colorful confetti.

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Cake by Kristy R., Pembroke, Ontario, Canada

This one was a lot of fun. I got the birthday cake recipe idea from the 2005 Wilton yearbook.

The base is a 12″ round, and the “tower” is three 5″ rounds. It’s all decorated with buttercream. The skyscrapers are made of royal icing, which I had made on waxed paper the day before, and they were extremely breakable. Luckily I made several extras because they kept breaking!

Wilton said to make them with Colorflow, but I didn’t have any so I took my chances with royal icing.

They looked about the same as they would have with Colorflow, but just weren’t as strong. I stuck sucker-sticks to the back of the skyscrapers with frosting, and stuck them into the cake that way.

We found some Micromachines on eBay, and they were just the right size for driving on the city street!

Boss cake by Stacy C., Houston, TX

I made this birthday cake design for Boss’s Day. The guy on the cake is supposed to be my boss. I included a picture of him to let you see how close I came.

To do his face I just let my initial icing layer firm up a bit then outlined what I wanted to draw and filled it in then smoothed it out. Then I went back in and added details after that firmed up a bit.

The football on the cake is a cheat. I bought those candies that you just stick on a cake. Everything else was me though!

Cake by Judith S., Lich, Germany

This cake is a simple chocolate cake which is decorated with colored Marzipan. A friend helped me to get the food coloring into the marzipan. I made it for a friend’s birthday. As you see, we both like the TV Series “Friends” a lot.

How we made the decoration: We kneaded the turquoise food color into marzipan (just as much as we needed for the background) and put it on the cake. Then we put on the rest of the marzipan, cut out the shapes we wanted, as you would do it with modeling clay and just taped it down with some water.

We added some icing, sugar, or just cooled the marzipan again when it got to sticky. We colored it with a brush and some food coloring.

Cake by Anna C., Olathe, KS

Here’s Anna’s Bomb Cake for a Spy Birthday Party!!

I was so excited to make this cake for my son for his 9th birthday! He wanted a Spy party, and I just didn’t like the other ideas for a cake. Then I happened to see a “Spy vs. Spy” cartoon, and remembered the round cake pan that I had from making a soccer ball cake the year before, and decided to make a bomb!

I had to get a Williams-Sonoma cake mix, because the mixes at the store all have pudding or are too moist to hold their shape in the ball. The mix is a little pricey (about $12) but well worth it!! There was enough batter left to make a small square (8×8) cake, also.

I iced it with a can of white Wilton Decorator’s Icing between the layers and around the cake. Then I made black fondant icing and placed it over the cake. I cut off the excess fondant after forming the ball. It worked beautifully! The white icing is a must, because it helps the fondant to stick.

Also, I had frozen the cake beforehand so it was easier to handle.

A little “platform” of icing helped it to stay in place on the tray. I used a sparkler instead of candles, which, of course, can not be blown out (but it was funny to watch my son try!) It was a HUGE hit!

Cake by Jessica S., Hudson, NY

I made this cake for my dad’s birthday. It is SOOOOO easy!!!

Make your cake, level and fill. Then, cut off two pieces to make a wedge and apply a crumb-coat in white icing (or whatever) to the top and rounded side and chocolate icing to the straight sides.

Next, refrigerate.

Then frost top and rounded side in white and frost straight sides in chocolate. Pipe ( Wilton tip #12) white frosting along straight sides at filling line. (This makes the appearance of a white filling in your “slice”). Pipe writing, but write only parts of the words “Happy Birthday” to give the appearance of your cake being a piece of a larger cake. Decorate as you like. It looks really cool.

Cake by Maria L., Somerville, MA

I made this cake for my friend and her family… I love to decorate cakes and this is my Night and Day masterpiece.

I used a 7 1/2 x 11 1/4 cake pan. After the cake was done and cooled I used vanilla icing for the cake. I used one side in blue for good night and white for good morning. I then used cardstock for the shapes I needed and placed each cardstock onto the cake. Once I liked how it was going to look, I used a tooth pick and poked holes around the shape. I then removed the cardstock and mixed several colors for the theme.

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