A friend of mine asked me if I could do a cake and cupcakes for his nephew's birthday. He is mad for something called Skylanders. Neither my friend nor myself had any idea what that was. He had brought a couple of toys with him to give me an idea of what they wanted. It didn't look like it was going to be that difficult. Along with the cake they wanted around 30 cupcakes cupcakes. I have to admit be being thrilled at the prospect of making something like this. I did a bit of research. The toy that the cake was to be shaped like is called a portal. It lights up and changes colour. My friend asked me if there was any way that we could light up the top of the cake. I said that I was sure we could figure out away.
It wasn't actually that hard in the end when I sat down and thought about it. My friend had strips of led lights so he wired 4 strips of those up. They, of course, wouldn't show through fondant icing so I needed to find a way to cover the lights. I remembered that you could get edible paper so thought that I might be able to get some of that to place on the top of the cake. I have attempted to use it before and it was pretty unsuccessful. I then remembered that I have some rice paper in the cupboard, the type used to make nougat. I also have a spray green colour. So I sprayed two sheets of the rice paper and used it to cover the lights. It worked really, really well.
For the cupcakes I found something call "elements" that would make good cupcake toppers. I considered buying something but in my searching I found these which I thought would be perfect. However I didn't have enough time to purchase them and have them shipped so thought that I might be able to make something similar myself. Mine weren't as good but then it looks like they were done with an air brush and I just used paint brushes to do the colours. I was so very pleased with how they turned out though and so was my friend. The party was yesterdat and I received a message that afternoon to say that the birthday boy was so very excited by it all, especially the fact that it lit up. The battery and switch for the lights were hidden in a cupcake that I hollowed out.
They really are brilliant! Great work!
ReplyDeleteThank you so much. I really enjoyed doing it. :)
ReplyDeleteWhat did you make the cupcake toppers out of? I am trying to figure this out now for my son's party next month!
ReplyDeletethank you!!
Sally, the toppers are made from fondant. I rolled it out and cut out with a fluted cutter that was about the same size the cupcakes were to be. I painted the circles with colouring gel thinned with rose spirit. I found a picture of the elements online and traced them onto baking paper and cut them out and used those as a template to cut them out of fondant and then stuck them to the bases with just a tiny dab of water on them (make sure not to wet it too much though). For the markings on the elements I just used some edible ink pens. Hope that helps.
ReplyDeleteVery helpful. Thank you for sharing. :)
DeleteThis cake is amazing.
ReplyDeleteDid you put the lights right on top of the cake or did you put some sort of barrier inbetween?
The top of the cake was covered in fondant, the lights were placed on it and then covered in confectionery rice paper which was sprayed with Wilton green spray.
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