Baby It's Cold Outside

Hello Steemians! I have just completed another cake for a baby shower. The theme is Baby it's cold outside. The design is based on three different photos sent to me by my client. She liked separate elements of each one so I made up a design to incorporate what she liked. She chose vanilla almond covered in fondant for the cake.

I cover my fondant cakes in dark chocolate ganache to give it a good base for the smoothest fondant finish. It also locks in freshness once that chocolate sets up. And it is yummy! I love the taste of vanilla cake with chocolate. Here is a picture I took of the ganached cakes, ready for fondant. The top tier is 8 inches and the bottom tier is 12 inches.

There is a middle tier made of a 10 inch styrofoam separator I covered in chevron fabric (one of the client's favorite elements, but she didn't need that much cake.) I added a food safe cake cardboard circle to the top and bottom of this disk to prevent the styrofoam from coming into contact with the cake. I also did this with the styrofoam disk I used for the cake topper.

The little snowbaby, sled and snowman topper is made of fondant and modelling chocolate. I rolled a cigar-size piece of white fondant and cut it into three successively bigger pieces for the snowman. Each piece was rolled into a smooth ball and then pushed onto a skewer, cut to the correct height for the stacked balls of fondant. I left the point of the skewer protruding from the bottom so it could be inserted into the foam disk I was using for the topper. Until it was completed, I had it stuck into a thick foam block and set a mason jar over it. This way, there would be no flat sections on the snowman from laying it on the table.

The baby is made with my small sleeping baby mold. I added a ruffled diaper, booties and snowman hat.

I made the sled with some modelling chocolate, rolled very thin, and pressed my wood grain impression mat into it before cutting out a rectangle shape. I had to flip it over and also add the impression on the curled up part of the sled. I used a knife to mark plank lines the length of the sled. I left it to dry over the handle of my pizza dough roller. It was the perfect height for the curled part. I love it when I can used a random kitchen tool for my cake decorating. To finish off the topper, I added some white cake glitter. (It is food safe, but not edible.) I think it gives the scene a lovely glistening, snowy effect.

The snowflakes and plaque/lettering were made with my cutters and alphabet molds. I dried the larger snowflakes and the plaque on the side of styrofoam cake dummies covered in parchment paper. This way, they were curved to the shape of the cake and wouldn't crack when I pressed them to the side of the cake tier. I didn't want to cut the dummies to make one side flat, so I set the whole thing inside a bowl so it wouldn't roll off the table. I used straight pins stuck into the styrofoam around the fondant pieces to hold them in place.

I hope the new Mommy and her guests enjoy this cake. I surely had fun making it!