Hello, i am new to this forum but have been reading many posts for weeeks now,
My partner is 30 on friday, i have been planning to make him a cake, a Jack Daniels Barrel cake.
I read many posts about Barrel shaped cakes.
So far i have Baked 2X 8" Round sponges, and 7x 10"
They are thawing out as i type, i have decided to make this cake as a large Batternberg, as my partner doesnt like cake! so they are pink annd yellow and almond and vannilia flavours.
ihave made up a buttercream icing with apricot jam, to crumb the cake with.
Whats really bugging me is carving this into the barrel shape and covering the cake with marzipan.
SCARY!
does anyone have any tips on carving?
Or any tips on the marzipan, obiously i am going for a woodern look so i am not sure if i should cover the cake then carve into the marzipan individual woodern slats or put these on the cake as long woodern slats seperately....
Thanks in advance!!!

One of my first cakes was a little barrel but I did it on its side to mean less stacking as I wasn't very experienced!

http://cakecentral.com/gallery/1910487/great-whiskey-keg

Sounds like you have a lot of cake so think about your structure, you'll probably need to make it in a number of stacked layers each on its own board (just google how to stack cake tiers for tutorials) and then cover in one big piece of marzipan (if iyou can- it will be hard to keep it from tearing at that size), strips may just fall off with their own weight, but then again they might be the only workable way! It might help to have a circle of marzipan on the top with each strip overlapping half way in with a little water or egg white.
Marzipan will prob have a nice cracked look which will look more like wood too

You'll not need to carve much to get your shape, I took off way less than I thought I needed and the shape was pretty spot on I think.

HTH can't wait to see a pic of the finished cake later

Hi, Thankyou so the advice!
I have the wooden slats on now, in individual slices, one question tho, how did you do the writing on yours??
I need to put the JD logo on....

I googled "free stencil font" and printed out the writing i wanted in the exact size a needed then with a very sharp knife i cut out the writing to make a stencil- with a tiny piece of sponge i dabbed black gel food colour very lightly- actually dabbed it on paper first to take off most of the colour because if you make a mistake it is there for ever!!

Really pleased its going well very jealous- battenburg is my favourite!! Lol

Ahhhh brilliant I shall try that!!
Well my partner hates cake! But likes a batternberg so hopefully he will like this..
It's going ok, I will post a few pics tomrorow when I continue with the marzipan
Thankyou so much your advice has been a life saver!