Unicorn cake!
Another adorable six year old girl, another unicorn cake, because obviously everyone is obsessed with all things unicorn!
This is a rather different, more subtle take on the standard rainbow theme, and I loved the cutesy figure and pastel-colored butterflies I found on this design.
The cake is my ‘lemon dream‘ cake: vanilla cake, drizzled with lemon syrup, filled with lemon curd mixed in with my italian meringue buttercream (1:1 ratio for extra lemony flavor) and covered in the buttercream.
For the decorations, I started a couple of days ahead to give the unicorn and butterflies time to dry. I tried to replicate the unicorn as best I could using white fondant and pastel colors for the mane and tail, and used the same colors to cut out a few dozen butterflies. To achive the 3D effect, I let them sit on a makeshift contraption out of cardboard folded in half and lined with parchment paper.
The cake is pretty tall, so I used the double barrel technique to stack it: I baked 3 9-inch round cakes, sliced them in half and used three layers for each cake. I placed one of the cakes directly onto the cake board and the other on a 9-inch round cake plate, much like I would if I were working on a 2-tiered cake.
I crumb coated each cake with the buttercream, allowed it to set in the fridge for 15’, then stacked the cakes using big straws cut to length. After that, it was just a matter of giving the entire cake a final coat of buttercream, smoothing it down with my bench scraper and covering the cake with fondant. It wasn’t too tall to require the paneling method, and with a bit of patience I was able to smooth out the creases all the way down to the base of the cake and trim the excess as usual.
To add the decorations onto the cake, I knew I had to work with something stronger than water or piping gel, given how little surface actually sticks onto the cake, so it was royal icing to the rescue.
Most royal icing recipes yield a lot of the sticky cake cement, and even the bare minimum will produce more than you’ll need – unless you have a couple of dozen cookies lying around and begging for decoration:
- 1 egg white
- 250 gr. powdered sugar
- the juice of 1/2 lemon
Just whisk everything together until it becomes thick and glossy. I piped tiny amounts along the crease of each butterfly and gently pressed it onto the cake for a few seconds until it was securely attached to the fondant. As soon as the icing dries out (and that happens fairly quickly), the decorations won’t budge.
Tip: although most recipes advise to keep the royal icing refrigerated for only up to 3 days in an airtight container, freezing your leftovers works just as well: just place it in a ziploc bag and remove as much air as possible and keep it in the freezer for up to a month. Thaw it out at room temperature when you’re ready to use it and it works fine. If it’s colored, it might separate a little, but it’s nothing a quick whisk can’t fix.
I finished the cake by placing the unicorn on top and adding the cut-out letters and number, and voila:
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