Tag Archives: vanilla spice cake

Someone’s having a bad day…Part 2: The Prime Birthday series

For my final birthday cake, I wanted to create the chest burster, and was originally going to make another black forest cake, but we still had leftovers from the first one. I opted instead to go with a spice cake made from a french vanilla box cake mix.

I used the lower fat version on the box – using applesauce instead of oil, and added about 1 tsp of each – cardamon, allspice, cinnamon,and ginger to the cake batter.

I proceeded as per the box and chose to use 3 pans instead of 2 to speed the cooking time and it gave me more layering of flavours!

Box mix of french vanilla – used apple sauce instead of oil and added spices!
3 – 8 inch cake pans
3 gorgeous fool proof layers!

Once the cakes cooled, I wanted to have a nice gentle flavour without being too sweet, so I had purchased some pre-made dulce de leche, and mixed about ⅓ cup with a few tablespoons of heavy cream and whipped it all together. I think butterscotch pudding would work in a pinch too 🙂

dulce de leche with heavy cream to be whipped together for the filling

After slicing off the domes of the layers – making them all level,  I stacked the three layers with apple sauce and the dulce/whip fillings.

layering with apple sauce and then the cream filling.

 

the cream filling over the apple sauce.

To create a nice base for the insertion of Fred, I built up the top with more sauce and cream filling and the sliced off domes, cutting the centre hole for Fred.

Capping it off with one of the cut off parts – to create a mound at the top of the cake. The hole is for the little guy!

And on to normal cake finishing – notes with each picture.

Crumb coat then chill – butter cream mixed with Dulce de leche.
the finishing layer of buttercream.
I like to smooth out the surface with wet fingers – well washed, of course! It lets the sugar melt just a tiny bit and creates a smoother look.

The final addition is – let’s call him Fred!

Sketch from DragoArt which was my inspiration!

I made him from rice crispie treats. I used pre-made ones as I did not want to purchase everything to make them and have leftover marshmallows etc. – but they are nut free…

stacking and squeezing
getting there…

The moulding chocolate was a new adventure and these folks here explained it best – so click to check their link – you can see most of the details there.

The difference with mine is that I used honey as a direct substitute for corn syrup and it worked perfectly.

Molding Chocolate – approx 250 grams
Honey – approx 3 ounces by weight.
The seized chocolate sealed in a bag and resting for about 8 hours.

And TADA !

Kneaded and moulded around the base and carved:

Hey Fred!
You can see the Rice Krispie square base that I left uncovered – it gave me a bit to handle for insertion into the cake later.

And finally  – fully set up at the party:

Meet Fred, dressed in cherry red….  pie filling syrup that is…

Two middle stages of Xenomorph life and the Birthday Guy!