Noah's Birthday and my special secret icing...

This evening I'm a proud mum. For a few reasons... 

First, my little guy has turned 3! He makes me proud every day (well, most days). 

Second, we had a little get together with friends to celebrate today and it was fun! I didn't stress too much beforehand and it all came together ok! 

But mostly, I'm proud of my cake effort. In the past, icing and I haven't really taken to eachother very well. We just don't get on. But this birthday I found a secret. And I'm going to share it with you... It's incredibly easy to make, tastes delicious and it makes cake decorating as easy as playdoh...

Here's Noah's cake...

Here's Noah blowing out the candles... (with me hiding in the background)

And because the cake itself was a bit special I had to show you that as well. It's a vanilla rainbow marble cake. Looks impressive. Dead easy to make. Ready for some instructions?

Vanilla Rainbow Marble Cake

250g (9oz) softened butter unsalted

2 cups (15 1/2oz) white sugar

4 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

3 cups (1lb) self raising flour

1 cup (8 1/2oz) milk

Preheat oven 180 degrees celcius (360 farenheit)

Grease and line your cake tin

Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy

Add eggs one by one, beat well after each

Beat in vanilla

Add sifted flour and milk a little at a time mixing well

Pour mixture into 5 bowls evenly.

Add 3-4 drops of colour to each bowl and mix.

(we used red, green, blue, yellow and purple)

Pour each colour into prepared tin and run a knife around the mixture in the tin to create marble effect. 

(you only need to run the knife around once or twice at the most - any more and your colours will blend into preschool brown)

Bake for around 35 minutes or until golden.

Marshamallow Fondant Icing

(aka: My secret weapon)

500g marshmallows

2 tablespoons water

1kg pure icing sugar

Seperate your white and pink marshmallows into 2 bowls.

Add one tablespoon of water to each bowl 

Take the first ones you want to work with and microwave on high for 2 minutes.

Once they start frothing take them out and mix with a spoon or knife till smooth.

Add your food colouring at this stage. Be generous as the colour will waeken a little as you add the icing sugar.

Start adding sifted icing sugar mixing as you go

Keep doing this until mixture turns into a dough like consistency.

Once it forms a ball, move it to a "sugared" bench (like a floured work space but using icing sugar instead of flour), and knead.

Roll into a ball and wrap in plastic cling wrap

Repeat for second colour

Refridgerate overnight

When you're ready to use your icing microwave it on high for 10-15 seconds to make it pliable again

Roll our to a thickness of around 5mm

Lay your sheet of icing over your cake

Trim excess at base

I used rolled up balls to cover the cut edge

And we used our playdoh cutters for the letters and shapes to decorate.

Simply wet your fingers with water to dampen the back of the shapes before placing them to "glue" in place.

Done!

Notes: Use a good brand of marshmallows - ones you'd eat anyway. If you use cheap nasty ones your icing will taste cheap and nasty too.

This fondant really is a godsend for me. I love making kooky cakes for the boys birthdays and I've never had any success with butter cream icing. I'll never use anything else now. This is incredible stuff.

Cake recipes via Hip Hip Hooray by Julie Lanham 

Marshmallow fondant recipe adapted from here