*Build-A-Bear School Cheerleader Cake* -bear shaped vanilla bean, butter cake with vanilla frosting, cocoa glaze with turbinado sugar coating, decorated with red, white and blue fondant and festive foil party picks for pom-poms
*Notre Dame Stadium/Touchdown Jesus Cake* -chocolate stadium cake decorated with blue and gold sparkle piping gel and blue and gold sugar sprinkles, fondant field, ND emblem, walkways and trees decorated with luster dust and a hand-painted "Touchdown Jesus" on gum paste in the end zone.
First, the Cheer Bear cake. Yes, the Build-A-Bear cake makes a return visit to my modest kitchen (see Ho-Ho-OH! November '09). I know, I know, I was a little...well, thrown last time this pan was used, but it's all a learning experience, so this time I was prepared. Right? Sort of. As this pan has been discontinued and impossible to find info on via the interweb, the cheerleader costume was completely custom made. And a real 'bear' to construct without the aide of helpful templates like the ones provided in the kits sold at Williams-Sonoma. But I thought this time would be different because I was using their cake recipe from the box and was confident there would be no cracked tails or missing ears once unmolded. I followed every direction to the letter, but it's cake, and I'm going to have to learn sometime cake will always win.
Luckily, no broken ears and the tail was intact-yippee! But to my shock and horror, the neck was not very sturdy on one side and there was a crack...a CRACK?! So I froze the cake in the hopes it would magically glue itself together. Little did I know that trying to frost a frozen cake would spell T-R-O-U-B-L-E, especially one that needs to stick together seamlessly. Trimming that cake while still in the pan when there wasn't enough batter, it just doesn't work. Frosting Try #2 came only after the fast frozen stuff was scraped off and the bear went under the knife. Then suddenly, it all came together, even the neck, crisis averted!
Dressing the bear was another challenge, but after learning to pleat fondant with the best of them, I thought I'd have a little fun and try a technique I saw in a very fancy cookbook I have called The Flour Pot Cookie Book by Margie and Abbey Greenberg. In the book, they show how you can embed rolled fondant with fondant cut-outs into a kind of wallpaper pattern. Once the pattern is complete, you can cut out whatever shapes you need with a cookie cutter or knife and use to decorate cookies or cakes with an extra fun flair! I know it's hard to tell from this picture, but this cheer bear's bow has paw prints on it...adorable! And who doesn't love a little shine and sparkle-RAH, RAH!
The second cake, a replica of Notre Dame's football stadium, came with a challenge of it's own-a request for a "Touchdown Jesus" to go with it. Now, I've gone to Catholic school my whole life, even stood in with my high school band for the Fighting Irish when their band couldn't make the trip for a ND v. Stanford football game (Go Cardinal!), but I had never heard of a "Touchdown Jesus". So research was in order. Imagine my surprise when it turns out that it was actually a mural on the campus library that can be seen from above the stadium near the end zone. It's really quite impressive, see for yourself! Since the cake itself didn't require frosting or fondant, it was nice to have the painting of the mural to spread my artistic wings. Just in case you are wondering, the nickname for the mural has to do more with the position of His arms than the location of the mural to the stadium. Either way, I think it's just hilarious!
Thank you Google Images!!!
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