Halloween Birthday Cake

A scary 10th Birthday cake in 24hrs....no problem!

As we all know, October 31st is Halloween. In our household, that date is also reserved for the birthday of our nephews Kyall and Dylan. 2010 marks the boys tenth birthday and after the success of last years Scream birthday cakes, the boys put the a request for another equally scary cake this year. No problem, except we had only on weekend to complete.

a tray of bakery cupcakes becomes.....

bloody eyeballs

So being that time was limited, we looked to cut corners where possible. The solution came in the form of a slab sponge and a tray of cupcakes from the local woolies. The fresh sponge was layered and covered in a chocolate butter cream with a hint of peppermint essence. The perfect base for our spooky grave. Next it was the tomb stone.

Having seen more episodes of Cake Boss and Ace of Cakes than one cares to admit we of course knew that the best material for sculpting in the cake world is ...... rice bubble slice of course. The recipe for rice bubble slice is:
300g Marshmallows
8 Cups of Rice Bubbles
160 g Butter
To make, melt the butter and marshmallows over a low heat.

stir constantly until melted and bubbly.

pour over rice bubbles, stir until combined and then press into a lined baking tray. Refrigerate for atleast a hour.

Fortunately we used a curved pyrex dish for the slice, so when it was sliced in half, the two halves came together to form a rounded grave stone

To give the grave stone support we layered skewers and royal icing between the two halves before sandwiching.

Once firm the rice bubble tomb stone was covered with rolled white icing and painted with black food colouring

To complete, the skull was modelled from white plastique icing, with the dirt coming care of crushed mint slice biscuits. Added to which a smattering of chopped lollies. A totally fun project which resulted in two very happy boys who loved their special cake.