Dog on Trampoline Cake

This is a bit niche; I made this cake for my friend's 50th birthday because her dog loves bouncing on the trampoline which is also home to her son's many footballs (hence the football candles). I hesitated to put this on here as I thought no one would need to know how to make a trampoline cake with a dog on it, but in light of the recent John Lewis christmas advert, I thought the idea might take off.

You will need:

9" round cake

Seedless jam (jelly)

Pastry brush

Icing sugar

10"+ round cake board (green if your trampoline is on grass)

Pale green fondant icing, approx 400g

Various other colours of fondant icing depending on what colour trampoline and dog you want to make

Cake lifter

Ball tool, cake smoother

Make or buy a 9" sponge cake, sandwiched together with jam and butter cream.

Spread a little butter cream on the centre of your cake board before placing your cake onto the board.

Mix about 4 tablespoons of seedless jam until it is lump-free. Spread this all over the top and sides of the cake with a pastry brush or similar. Wipe any smears off the cake board

Lightly dust a work surface with icing sugar. Roll out some pale green fondant icing into a long rectangular shape. Measure the height of the cake and cut the icing to this width and if your cake is 9" diameter, as mine is, the length of icing needs to be 29".

Wrap the icing around the sides of the cake and smooth down. Don't worry about the join - we hide that later.

Next roll out a quantity of grey or black fondant for the top of the cake (trampolines are usually black but as I was making a black dog I decided on grey). Use your cake tin to cut a perfectly fitting circle for the top of the cake. Place the circle of fondant on top of the cake.

Now make the trampoline legs by moulding four thin lengths of grey fondant, make them about 1cm longer than the height of the cake. Place one of these over the join of the green fondant, and squash the overlapping end onto the top of the cake. Place the other three at equal distances around the cake - one per quarter.

Choose what colour you want your dog to be. Knead some fondant of this colour and mould into a fat oblong shape.

Make a cut with a sharp knife from the centre of one of the short ends to about a third of the length.

Smooth the two parts with you fingers to make leg shapes.

Manipulate little stumps out from the sides at the back end of the oblong and gradually mould these longer and bend them round towards the front of the body. Mark little lines at the ends with a knife or cocktail stick to make them look like little paws.

Mould some fondant into a cone shape, then make a small indent on top by rolling your finger gently from side to side.

Make a slit with a sharp knife for the mouth.

Place a small rounded piece of pink fondant for a tongue.

Mould small oblongs of fondant for ears.

If your dog is light coloured you could draw eyes and nose on with a food colouring pen (wait until the fondant has firmed up before doing this).

If your dog is black, you can add a small spherical shaped piece of black fondant to the tip of the snout for the nose. For the eyes I made small holes with a cocktail stick and placed tiny blobs of brown fondant into the holes and smoothed down with my finger.

Make a disc of coloured fondant for the collar. Place this at the front of the dog's body above the legs. Insert a piece of dry spaghetti or cocktail stick into the centre of the disc. Place the head on top of this.

Shape a long piece of fondant for a tail and place on the back of the dog and curve it round to one side.

Moisten the edges on top of the cake, either brush with a small amount of water or use some water icing.

Roll out some blue fondant onto a surface dusted with icing sugar.

Use a bowl or similar with approx 7" diameter to cut around. If the inner edge of the circle is not neat you could smooth it out with a ball tool.

Use a cake lifter to transfer the blue circle onto the top of the cake (it is essential to use a cake lifter otherwise the fondant will stretch and go out of shape). Make sure the blue fondant is placed centrally and let the excess hang down the sides of the cake. Use a sharp knife or scissors to trim the excess neatly away.

Smooth the edges down.

Moisten a small area on top of the cake and place the dog onto it.

Make some grass and flowers out of fondant to stick on the sides of the cake:

Cut small rectangles of green and make two slits with a knife to represent clumps of grass.

I made small flowers by moulding four tiny balls of fondant. Place them in a square shape near to each other and squash them together with your finger tip. Make another small ball of fondant in a contrasting colour and squash this into the centre of the flower.

I couldn't work out a way to make it look like the dog was bouncing. Maybe if you are brave you could attach it to a big spring!