MOST AWESOME HALLOWEEN CAKE EVER!!! DUN DUN DUN!!!

seriously... its awesome... i know ... cause my wife made it... shes cooler than you... so cool in fact she made a whole kitchen into her costume.

she has this gift called... not sucking at life like you... so its what she does... 

anyways the cake is amazing...

see look at it... BAM!!!



did you just pee a little... i did... ill be back in 5 minutes after cleaning up. then we can start on how awesome this cake is



so first things first. SAFETY!!!!!

always stay safe when working with knifes or mixers or anything necessary to make this MOST AWESOME HALLOWEEN CAKE EVER!!!!

first thing you are going to need to do here is simple... buy a bunch of ingredients...

there are many ways to do this... but lets start off simple... instead of me telling you how to make cake from scratch and fondant from scratch and food coloring from the souls of dead baby angle puppies... lets just assume you bought a box cake plus icing and fondant plus food coloring and all that crap from the store...

If anyone really wants to know how to make cake from scratch post a comment and i can post a couple of recipes the wife has... 

so... first thing you need to do is get out your fondant... and kneed in the food coloring... as you can see from these pictures... fondant starts off white... you can buy already color fondant... IF YOUR NOT AWESOME LIKE MY WIFE BOOYAA!!!! 

to make the ear basically you just need to be real creative...
1. start off with a quarter inch thick kidney bean shaped piece of fondant the size of an ear
2. then slowly press in where you want the shaped to be lowered as if its a real ear.
3. you can use wood carving techniques and scrape some of the fondant out with your finger if neccesary.

the hand is much easier to make and explain

make 5 hot dogs 1 hamburger patty and press them together... 

GOOD TIP TIME

add water with a paint brush were you want fondant to attach to other fondant.  it creates a bond like glue... but it needs to sit over night with pressure on it... hence the food coloring containers siting next to it.

THAT STUPID FINGER... ok... so this is where we give you one of the most important tips to keeping this whole thing realistic... texturing

SAFTEY PLEASE!!!! you are about to handle something really sharp... so please be safe and do not hurt anyone or your self... because i said so.

1. you find a finger you dont like... and grab an ax... be sure to tell the hand your going to count to three... but then dont really count to three and just lop that damn thing right off... the fondant finger you dont want... not a real hand.

so as you see in the picture... the finger tip gets removed... 

2. take a knife or in this case a razor ... something that is real sharp... and score up every piece you can to make a ruff random looking surface... something that seems like it has been torn. you will use this method a lot later on other things like the cuts on the wrist and the break of the forearm

its a nice simple way to make it look realistic

you can see in the second picture she is using this methon really quickly to create the textured look.

GOOD TIP TIME

if you wanted you can roll up a small piece of fondant around a toothpic and shove it in the spot where the missing finger is... so that it looks like a bone sticking out... we opted not to do that... eh... to each there own.

this next part... is very important... its called the shaping of the cake.

I know i am not covering how to bake a cake... if you want me too. post a comment up and let me know you want me to show you how to bake a cake... For this we went with chocolate cake... and chocolate butter cream icing... you could have used redvelvet cake to make it more realistic with a vanilla icing with red food coloring... but hey... we wanted something that tasted like chocolate... so eh. experiment with what ever you want...

GOOD TIP TIME

if you wanted you could have used a red velvet cake and carved out a tunnel inbetween the two layers of cake and added white icing in there for the look of a bone.  Making cakes doesnt have to be just about the outside. you can do what ever you want... thats what makes it fun.

so... the most important part is the shape of the cake... basically you just need to be really awesome here... LIKE MY WIFE...

so anyways, lets get to it awesome pretenders.  ;)  

once you bake your cake you need to cut out the basic outline of the arm... if you wanted you could do this exact same thing for two arms or a chest and or even a head 

we did it with a giant heart and a fore arm.  

we went with a 2 layer cake here so there is a layer of icing in the middle

GOOD TIP TIME

make sure the cake has cooled down to room temp before handling or cutting... or else the cake could easily fall apart... its still fragile when its warm. you can even put it in the fridge for an hour or so to garauntee it is cool enough... just make sure to wrap it up so it doesnt dry out.

SAFETY PLEASE!!!!  you are about to use more sharp objects... so be carefull handleing a knife

as you see in the picture we used a large bread knife made specifically for this purpose... i have heard that electric carving knifes work good here too... but we dont have one... so we go old school with it.

the biggest thing is making the general shape and curve on the top layer of cake... the top layer needs a nice dome curve on it

once you got the shape you want... putt icing on it... then throw it in the fridge while you get ready for other steps

GOOD TIP TIME!!!

so an easy way to make ising smooth is this.  first put a really light layer of icing on the cake (called a crumb layer) then put it in the fridge for a half hour and pull it back out... now the cake is a little stiffer and so is the first layer of icing... now add icing liberally.  now after you have added that later... put it back in the fridge AGAIN (GOSH!!!) then after it has colled off a little bit more (about 15 minutes) get wax paper and gently lay the wax paper over the cake and use an icing spreader over the wax paper... so that the wax paper creates a buffer layer between the spreader and the icing. This will allow the icing to lay smooth and not stick to the spreader...  BIG TIP... do this quickly so as not to warm the icing back up.

All the pictures have helpfull tips on them... please read them all... some  are just annoying. you have been warned.
 

this is where things start to get a little more real

the fondant

rolling out fondant takes skill... there are tools out there to help you roll fondant smooth and easy.

http://www.amazon.com/Wilton-Fondant-Inch-Rolling-Pin/dp/B0007ZM57Y/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1351700669&sr=8-1&keywords=fondant+roller

http://www.amazon.com/Prime-Pacific-Stainless-Steel-Machine/dp/B000CH7BX0/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1351700669&sr=8-5&keywords=fondant+roller


but nothing beats practice

im not going to lie to you here, and say this is easy... its not... practice with a few small cakes on learning how to lay fondant... if you already know... then good for you. its hard to do... i will admit that my wife does this part... and i dont even get to think about doing it hahahahahahah

the good thing about this cake... is it doesnt have to be smooth... because you can just cut it up later and pretend the cut was supposed to go there... 

after you roll the fondant out ... you need to transfer it over the cake... 

once on the cake... slowly work your way around the cake and press the fondant into the sides of the cake. be very gentle so not to tear the fondant... and work on a dry surface.

GOOD TIP TIME!!!!
 use powdered sugar like you would flower on bread... it keeps the fondant from sticking to everything. sprinkle some on the table and just powder your hands with it.  this creates a dry buffer between you and the fondant and the fondant and the table.

keep reading those picture tags... they are benificial.

this is where we get to the heart of the problem... hahahahah i said heart... man im funny... 

basically treat this as nothing more than a different shaped forearm... it really is all the same steps as making the forearm except for a few different details like the valves and the veins

You need to roll out some extra fondant (any color doesnt mater it is going to be covered later anyways... you can use read so that later when some one cuts into it ... they get a red vein instead of a black vein.  we went with white because we are not that worried about what it looks like when it is cut...


once you roll this into a vein like shape you need to lay it down in a very vein like patern.  veins usually start big then branch off into smaller veins which then branch off even more.

so we did a similar technique on this heart.

the next key is to make sure that after you lay the fondant down over the heart... to gently press the fondant down around the veins. This is to insure the veins really pop out at you.

GOOD TIP TIME!!!

my wife is talented... she can use some very sharp tools to do something this delicate. I do not suggest using tools for this. I suggest using your hands (your knuckles and fingers) to press on the fondant. It can creat un even dents and even tear the fondant.  A whole in the fondant at this point is a huge problem. So go lightly and use your hands.

The only thing left is the Valves... the are all just cylenders of fondant attached with water and allowed to let dry ... we used papertowls to support the valves while they dried.

we need to now address the things that make me people keep looking at the cake and staying surprised.

things like fingernails that are chipped cuts in the arm and bones sticking out...

all of this is done with fondant.


for the fingernails... you can do any color.   We went with black fondant and cut up the ends of them. Using water to attack them they can dry in a few hours.

for the cuts in the arm.  Basically you need to first cut out a section... as if you where digging out a canoe.. but a very skinny long canoe. This makes it apear that the skin is pulled back some. then after that you need to texture the ends of the cut like you did the finger tip...

the large severed section of the forearm is a bit different.. around the outside of the cake we treated the skin the same way we did the smaller cuts.  in the center where there would normally be muscles and bones we did longer cuts as if the muscles where there. We are not doctors... so we dont really know what it should look like but we guessed.

for the bones... we just rolled up white fondant and stuck tooth picks in it to stick inside the arm.  on the other end of the fondant we cut it with some chopping things... and made it look broken.


shes starting to look good right? 

this part can be done in two different ways... we opted for the cool way... cause ... do i need to say it... ok fine... my wife is AWESOME!!!

the cool way is is with an airbrush... the other way is with a paint brush... both create about the same effect... 

you just want to add slight discoloration of the skin and then make sure to darken where the blood is going to be

we just went over the edges of the hand and ear with red shimmer food coloring.  added more dear the cuts and gashes. we also added lavender shimmer around the skin of the cuts and gashes... and in a couple of random spots to create a bruising look.

we also need to add the first bit of blood in the cracks.  this is made with just red food coloring and lavender shimmer food coloring (the lavender has a glitter effect to it which makes it shine) plus some Karo syrup... yep... best thing for blood when you want to eat it 

GOOD TIP TIME!!!

there are a few different ways to make blood that you can eat. 
1. karo syrup and food coloring.
2. karo syrup and food coloring plus chocolate syrup to make it a little thicker
3. karo syrup and food coloring plus chocolate syrup to make it a little thicker with a touch of peanut butter

DO NOT USE PEANUT BUTTER IF SOME ONE AT YOUR PARTY IS ALERGIC TO PEANUTS.

THE FINAL STEP

presentation is everything

if you dont believe me... ask the best chefs in the world... there cooking isnt always better than yours... but i'll be damned if it doesnt just look amazing... because

presentation is everything

now that we got the cake completed... we just need to mix up some more blood and throw it all over the place... like the heart and the cake board next to the cut up forearm.

plus add the bones and other decorations to the table top

so with the extra amount of blood ... you can really start to see how this can become very realistic.

i really hope you guys enjoyed this... and make sure you read all the tags in the pictures... they will help you in creating the same thing