Lots of Dots

What kind of cake do you design for a man who really isn't that into celebrating his birthday this year? A youthful dots and ribbons design with no mention of name and number! This chocolate chip cake with chocolate filling was iced in Italian meringue buttercream and covered smoothly in a not-too-green marshmallow fondant. Fondant circle and ribbons, along with royal icing dots and a border, helped to boost the birthday boy's spirits!

Super Mario Cake

This was my son's second birthday cake this year. Yesterday, we celebrated with a small party at his favorite movie theater. Though I had about ten times more cake than I actually needed, the look on his face was worth all the time, effort ... and research!

I closely studied the characters and features of the game so that I could make the game come to life in cake; I tried to immerse myself in all things Mario! Because my brother is quite the video game aficionado, he became my official "consultant" for this one. ... I drove him crazy! 

The cake was actually three separate cakes: The top of the mushroom was vanilla sponge cake baked in a ball pan; the bottom of the mushroom was a sponge cake carved into the shape of the mushroom base; and the three-layer 9-inch base cake was my signature dark chocolate cake filled with Italian meringue buttercream. Mario and all the other characters were made out of fondant and the grass was created by piping royal icing. I am thankful that I got good pictures of the cake prior to the kids seeing it, because it was demolished in about two minutes flat!