Zoo Animal Birthday Cake
This Zoo Animal Birthday Cake has different zoo exhibits for the animals. The inside of the cakes are tiger stripe, zebra stripe, and rainbow leopard print.
Servings 24
Equipment
- disposable nitrile gloves, optional
- small fondant rolling pin with guides
- paring knife
- one 13x9-inch pan, two round 8-inch pans, two round 6-inch pans
- cake baking strips
- large 19x13-inch rectangular cake board
- animal figurines, such as lions, elephants, polar bears
- small train
- plastic trees and plants
- disposable piping bags
- small grass tip, like Wilton #233
- Plastic tip coupler, optional
Ingredients
- white and black rolled fondant
- powdered sugar for dusting the fondant
- Everclear or vodka optional
- 2 or 3 batches white or vanilla cake see note
- gel food coloring in gold, black, brown, orange, pink, teal, purple, and green
- Easy Vanilla Buttercream see note
- 2 cans chocolate frosting
- Kit Kat bars
- Pirouline Cookies
- blue decorating gel
- royal blue disco cake dust optional
Instructions
Make the Safari Print Fondant Letters:
- To make safari letters in zebra, leopard, giraffe, tiger and cheetah prints, put on disposable nitrile gloves to protect your hands when tinting the fondant.
- For the leopard and cheetah, use a small amount of brown gel and work it into the white fondant to make a light brown color. Use gold gel to tint some white fondant for the giraffe print and orange for the tiger.
- To make the zebra letters, roll out white and black fondant on a cutting board or mat using a small fondant rolling pin with a small amount of powdered sugar to prevent sticking. Use a sharp knife to cut out the white letters and the black zebra stripes, then adhered the stripes onto the white background using a small amount of water. You can also use alcohol, like Everclear or vodka.
- Repeat this process for all of the animal patterns.
- After the letters are assembled, brush them with a thin layer of Everclear to remove or dissolve any powdered sugar remnants. This gives the letters a more vibrant appearance.
- Use the letters immediately or allow the letters to dry at room temperature for a couple days.
Bake the Cakes:
- Prepare two 6-inch cakes according to the method outlined in the Rainbow Leopard Print Cake recipe.
- To make the Zebra and Tiger Stripe Cakes, spray two 8-inch cake pans and one 13x9-inch pan with baking spray. Add moist baking strips around the cake pans.
- Divide the batter into 3 portions. Leave one plain and tint the others black and orange.
- To make the Zebra Stripe Cakes, place about four tablespoons of untinted batter into the center of each 8-inch round pan. Then, directly into the middle of the untinted batter, place two tablespoons of black batter. Directly into the center of the black batter, place two tablespoons of untinted batter. Alternate black and untinted batter until the pans are ⅔ full.
- Bake the cakes according to your recipe's instructions until baked through. Do not overbake.
- For the Tiger Stripe Cake, spoon 2 rows and 3 columns of orange cake batter so there are 6 circles of about ¼ cup each. Top each circle with a large spoonful of black cake batter and then a smaller amount of untinted batter.
- Repeat this process until all of the batter has been added and the 6 circles all touch as if one layer of cake batter.
- Bake the cake according to your recipe's instructions.
- Allow the cakes to cool for 10 minutes in the pans and then unmold the cakes onto cooling racks to cool completely. Wrap the cakes tightly in plastic wrap and store at room temperature until you're ready to assemble the cake.
Assemble the Cake:
- Smear some vanilla buttercream in the upper left corner of a large 19x13-inch rectangular cake board. Place the tiger striped 13x9 cake in the upper left corner of the cake board. Spread a circle of vanilla buttercream on the upper left corner of the 13x9 cake and a circle of chocolate frosting on the bottom right corner.
- Stack the two 8-inch zebra striped cakes on top in the upper left corner of the 13x9-inch cake to make the lion exhibit, using vanilla buttercream between the layers.
- In the upper right of the cake board, place the two 6-inch Rainbow Leopard Print Cakes with vanilla buttercream in between the cake layers to make the polar bear exhibit. Leave space for train tracks and a train in front of the polar bear exhibit, with an alligator pond in the lower right of the board.
- Spread chocolate frosting to cover the remaining exposed surfaces of the 13x9-inch cake and over the entire cake board to represent dirt or ground.
- Cover the layered Rainbow Leopard Print Cakes with vanilla buttercream to represent ice.
- Press full size Pirouline Cookies into the sides of the zebra striped cake to make an enclosure for the lion.
- Press full size Pirouline Cookies into the sides of the Rainbow Leopard Print Cake to to make an enclosure for the polar bears, leaving the front open.
- Carefully cut the Pirouline Cookies in half to make enclosures for the other animals: a leopard, a zebra, a giraffe, and an elephant.
- Use Kit Kat bars to represent walls to separate these animals from each other. The placement is based on which animal goes where and the size of the animal. One possible arrangement is to put the cheetah in the front left, the zebra in the middle, the giraffe on the right, and the elephant in the back.
- For the polar bear exhibit, make a circle of vanilla buttercream on the cake board in front of the stacked Rainbow Leopard Print Cakes.
- Spread a thin layer of blue food gel on the top and down the front side of the cake and on top of the vanilla buttercream circle on the board to represent a water feature and waterfall for the polar bears. Sprinkle the gel with a little blue disco dust.
- Place two Kit Kat bars in front of the polar bear exhibit to represent train tracks.
- Spread a small rectangle of buttercream in the lower right corner of the board and cover it in a thin layer of blue decorating gel to represent water for the alligator. Sprinkle the gel with some royal blue disco cake dust for a little sparkle.
- Place the fondant letters in the lower left corner of the board.
- Place the animals and the trees on the cake, using evergreen trees for the polar bear exhibit and tropical trees for the animals that live in warm environments.
- Tint vanilla buttercream a deep green color by using small amounts of black or brown gel with green to achieve this color.
- Transfer the green buttercream to a disposable piping bag with a grass tip and pipe grass in all of the animal exhibits, except for the polar bears', and even around the back of the zoo. The grass is an easy way to hide any imperfections or gaps in the cake.
Notes
Sugar Spun Run Vanilla Cake recipe HERE
Rainbow Leopard Print Cake recipe HERE
Zebra Stripe Cake and Tiger Stripe Cake adapted from Cookies, Cupcakes and Cardio
Easy Vanilla Buttercream recipe HERE
You're Gonna Bake It After All
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