40+ Coolest Homemade Popcorn Cake Ideas

Take a look at these cool homemade Popcorn cake ideas shared with us by cake decorators from around the world. Along with the birthday cakes here, you’ll also find loads DIY birthday cake-making ideas and how-to tips to inspire your next birthday cake project. Enjoy!

And don’t forget… if you end up with a cool cake, have great tips to share or pictures of awesome birthday cakes you’ve made in the past, share them here and be a part of our coolest birthday cake community.


Latest Popcorn Cake Ideas



Featured Cakes

Cake by Amy F., Ortonville, MI

Coolest Popcorn Cake Photos and How-To Tips

I started this popcorn cake by baking a 9 x 13″ cake. I cut in into sections and stacked them on top of each other. Then I used fondant for the bag. The “popcorn” is made from gum paste.

Cake by Jenn F., SA, TX

Popcorn Cake

I got the idea for the popcorn cake right here! I suggest using a yellow or white cake mix; the chocolate cake can give the cake “freckles” mixed in the icing. Fruit roll-ups cut with a pizza cutter is how I got the skinny stripes. I couldn’t find shoestring licorice. It was a huge hit. Everyone in the restaurant wanted to come by and see it. Good luck!

Cake by Debbie S., Edinburg, TX

Popcorn Cake

I made this popcorn cake for four of my grandchildren. I thought maybe a Friday night Movie Entertainment night would be fun and delicious. This was made very simply with a 9 X 13 oblong cake pan. Iced with white buttercream frosting and using tip # 3, colored up some red icing.

I made straight lines up and down the cake to represent the popcorn box. I used black frosting to write “Popcorn” in the middle. I then made up some light yellow in coloring frosting with a little orange and piped out with # 12 tip what appears to be popcorn. With the orange I made the kernels in the middle of the popped corn. The kids loved it!

Cake by Kim F., Schreiber, ON

Popcorn Cake

Bake any flavor of cake mix you would like in a 9×13 pan as directed on the box for this popcorn cake. Cool Cake. Ice the entire cake with white icing. Place fun fruit roll strips over cake (Strawberry Flavor). These will need to be cut to fit.

On your computer draw an oval circle filled-in in black. Write the word “Popcorn” in white and print. Cut oval and place in middle of cake. For the popcorn you will need to pop one microwave bag of corn. Melt 1/4 cup of butter and vanilla and add 250 g bag of marshmallows. Melt marshmallows down and add popped corn. Once the mixture is cool enough to handle, place it around the top and sides of the popcorn cake.

Cake by MaryKay, Kiev, Ukraine

Popcorn Cake

The tops of cupcakes made to look like popcorn (for a popcorn segment in a 2nd grade class). This popcorn cake came from the Family Fun website.

Cut mini-marshmallows in half and immediately squish the sticky sides back together to form a piece of “popcorn”. Place the popcorn marshmallows on top of icing balls that you create on top of each cupcake. This cake idea can be great for a circus theme birthday part as well.

Cake by Doreen B., Franklin, MI

Popcorn Cake

It was my son Jack’s 7th birthday and we wanted to have the theme “Dinner and a Movie” on our new 67″ DLP television. When trying to come up with a cake I searched the internet for an idea with no luck, just finding the popcorn cupcakes from Family Fun. I wanted to make a bucket of popcorn cake.

I made a regular box cake with four round layers. I used premade Fondant and rolled it out to cover just the sides of the cake. I then used red Petal Dust mixed with an alcohol base liquid to make paint and painted on the red stripes.

I used black royal icing to make the popcorn bubble with “HAPPY BIRTHDAY JACK” inside of it. Then I frosted the top of the cake with white frosting. To make it look like popcorn I used regular size marshmallows and cut them up into four pieces.

Then smash two or three pieces together and put on top of cake until it looks like a bucket of popcorn. The popcorn cake was a big hit and my sister thought it was real popcorn when she walked in the door.

Popcorn Cake
Popcorn Cake

Cake by Mary N., Stevensville, MD

Popcorn Cake

A friend of mine asked me to make a popcorn cake for her son’s Cub Scout silent auction to go along with her “night at the movies” theme. I took a 11×15 sheet pan and made approximately three cake mixes which I’ve got down to a science (in my goofy oven), it takes 45-55 minutes to cook perfectly.

Once it cooled I cut the cake in half and leveled the cake. I made one of the halves smaller (about 2 1/2″) than the other. I iced the top of larger half with butter cream icing and put the other half on top making sure I lined up the bottom edges. Then I iced the cake entirely.

Next I rolled out white fondant and formed it onto the cake. The cake kind of looked like a car at this point (other possibilities). Once I had the white fondant on the cake; I rolled out the red and yellow fondant and applied it to the cake. For the popcorn I made about three microwave bags of popcorn. I melted down butter and marshmallows (like rice crispy treats) and poured the mixture over the popcorn. I put the popcorn on the 2 1/2″ of the bottom cake that stuck out and rounded it off at the top.