Tom's Birthday Cake

After mulling it around in my head for at least 5 months now, the time had finally come to make the cake Tom, my boyfriend, had asked for- a dinosaur cake. I received a box of Wilton Fondant for Christmas, had designed the cake only to realize how hard it was to 1) work with fondant... more specifically, mold it into shapes and figures you so desire and 2) transporting a fondant cake and hiding it from the guest of honor for a day or two.

The layout was pretty much the same as I drew in my plans, but the coloring and the volcano and don't even get me started on the dinosaurs. They did not exactly come to fruition the way I wanted them to so I went to Party City and bought a bag of little plastic dinos for about 3 bucks.

I had originally wanted to bake him a homemade [not Pillsbury] Funfetti cake, but as luck would have it, the two grocery stores nearby did not have a large container of the long rainbow sprinkles. They didn't even have the boxed Pillsbury mix. However, at Westside Market, they had Duncan Hines "Confetti" cake mix. I bought two boxes since I figured there were going to be at least 20+ people.

NEVER BUY CAKE MIX IN A BOX!!

I knew going into it that I could come out with an artificial-tasting, preservative-filled cake, which is exactly what happened. I was so mad. 1 cake and 12 cupcakes (6 eggs!) gone to waste. I thought about serving it only because people might be drunk enough not to notice, but deep down, I'd know and I couldn't ruin my reputation as a budding baker. (I kept the cupcakes thinking they were still edible, but the fondant i had covered them with got too soft and came off because I stacked them on top of one another. Long story short- Tom's roommate Jason told me not to throw them out and ate them, so I guess it wasn't a total waste)

The next day, I found a basic white cake recipe:

* 1-1/2 cups white sugar
* 3/4 cup butter
* 3 eggs
* 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
* 2-1/4 cups all-purpose flour
* 2-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
* 3/4 cup milk

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour a 9x9 inch pan or line a muffin pan with paper liners.
2. In a medium bowl, cream together the sugar and butter. Beat in the eggs, one at a time, then stir in the vanilla. Combine flour and baking powder, add to the creamed mixture and mix well. Finally stir in the milk until batter is smooth. Pour or spoon batter into the prepared pan.
3. Bake for 30 to 40 minutes in the preheated oven. For cupcakes, bake 20 to 25 minutes. Cake is done when it springs back to the touch.

I set aside 6 little bowls for a cup of batter each and dyed each one a different color: blue, green, red, yellow, orange, purple and I had a little white batter left over. I mixed well and layered each color over each other (I'd double the recipe to get more colored batter and bigger layers) in a 13" x 9" pan.

It looked like this. not the most appetizing but....



when baked, it looks like



When cut in half and layered with vanilla pudding then covered in fondant by yours truly?




It was pretty good if I do say so myself! It tastes just like a regular white cake. Moist, dense, not too sweet (I used less sugar in the recipe because I knew the fondant would be pretty sweet). People complimented me on it so I will definitely save this for a future occasion.

Things I've learned from this experience:
Fondant dries out if not kept wrapped up.
Fondant will stiffen when kept in your fridge, and will get super gooey when brought back to room temperature. Make sure it's not touching anything else if you want to keep your fondant smooth!!
Wear plastic gloves when dying Fondant. Your hands WILL turn whatever color you are using.

I am going to make another cake for his actual birthday on the 16th. Maybe.

Happy 25th Birthday, Tom!! <3