Birthday cake: Allie the dog

Hello Cherubs 

It was another birthday weekend, which in my world means cake. For some reason it’s been a month of hounds. This birthday cake was inspired by a much-loved little canine called Allie. Allie has the funniest quirk I’ve ever seen in any animal. She’s a gentle wee soul who simply cannot, CANNOT, greet you without something in her mouth. She’ll pick up a shoe (or even two), a cushion, a jandal, a toy, whatever can fit into her mouth and isn’t bolted down. She’s just too cute.

So Allie became a cake for her lovely mum’s birthday.

The first thing I did was make the bow to go around the cake. I made it out of gum paste (or flower paste) because it sets hard and won’t cave in with humidity. Here’s the tutorial I followed to make mine.

Next you have to ice your cake. Roll out your fondant (~3mm thick) on some icing sugar so it doesn’t stick. I like using icing sugar because you don’t get that pasty flour taste. Cover your cake (which is iced in butter cream, always) with the fondant by gently rubbing it with your hands. I sprinkled some lustre dust on my hands while smoothing it out to get a beautiful shimmery surface. I wanted to create a cushion-like effect, so once I’d trimmed the edges I took a bread knife and gently pressed it along the cake to get stitches. 

You can buy fancy tools for this, but heck, the bread knife does the trick just fine. Just don’t get too excited and cut into your cake because there will be tears, squire.

Once you’ve got your beautifully stitched up cake, you can make little Allie. Again, she’s literally a large oval, with a smaller oval on top, stuck together with sugar glue. Once you’ve done that, roll out some sausages for her legs. Stick the front ones on first, then the back legs. Glue her ears on and shape her face just a little. Score in some fur around her feet and stick on some eyes. Glue on her nose and tongue, give her some nostrils, and there you have it. A simple little hound with a thing for shoes.

Stick her on the cake along with a jandal and a cushion. I just used a really fine round icing tip for the texture details on both the jandal and cushion. Cut a long strip of fondant for the ribbon and glue it on. Cut out some fondant strips for the bottom of the bow. Add some pearls with royal icing where the stitches on the cake cross over. For the final touch, add the gumpaste bow with some royal icing

It may seem like a lot of work, but once you’ve mastered fondant you’re only limited by your imagination.  It’s so much fun to see little kids (and kids at heart) light up at the sight of their birthday cakes. I can’t wait for the next one!

Have a happy day! 

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