It was my youngest nephew's first birthday yesterday (his name is JJ). I wanted to make him a small cake for the family dinner (he is supposed to have a party later on in November)
Anyway, i baked 2 pineapple coconut cakes (new recipe), and one dark chocolate mud. Very small cakes, the 2 pineapple ones were 6 and 5 inches, and the choc was a 4 inch cake. I wanted three tiers without having too many servings, there was probably only going to be about 20 of us. The mudcake was perfect, but the pineapple cakes were not high enough, so with the two i torted them and trimmed them and made one 5 inch cake. That meant i had to bake another 6 inch cake for the base. But i was very short on time so I had to do it on the same night i was going to assemble the cake, which was Wednesday night. I baked a cake, and cut it up, it was soo soft and fluffy, and i go and fill it with custard . Now if i had iced it in buttercream at this point and left it alone, without anything else, it would have been fine. Instead i put fondant on it, and it started to bulge, i chucked it in the freezer hoping (against all odds) that it would be ok. HAHAHHAHAHA AS IF!
Then i took it out after about 20 minutes and proceeded to stack the two little cakes on top, hahahahahaha
of course it started to lean and bulge and collapse!!!!
In the end i took the smaller cakes off and made a two tier cake instead, poor munchkin got a crooked cake for his 1st birthday. Still he tried to eat bits of the icing, but we couldnt let him have too much of it or any cake cause he had gastro. Poor chubs!!!
Anyway here is the collapsed cake and what i ended up doing with the two tiers.

http://www.cakecentral.com/cake-photo-76233.html

sigh!!!
On the upside, the pineapple cake was delicious!!! it was filled with Sylvia Weinstock's buttercream filling flavoured with fresh lemon juice, hmmmmmm YUM
Nati : )
PS: Thanks to Fran(franjmc) for all the great tips she's posted over time on how to make those bows : )
PPS: Moral of the story is, not to put fondant on very soft cakes and not to bake, tort and decorate on the same night!!

Poor baby not feeling well on his birthday!! The cake turned out beautiful though. I love all your cakes. You do a GREAT job!

THANK YOU for sharing your experience. Lately I've been thinking about "soft" and moist cakes and how I wish they were easier to stack and work with. Then I started thinking that maybe covering them with fondant would help hold them together. You probably saved me from a major disaster and waste of time!

Sorry you had such a hard time. The cake is adorable - it has such character (lol).

AWWW. Poor baby. Sick on his b-day. At least you were still able to give him a cake. Hey, delicious is the main goal right.? It doesn't matter how pretty a cake is if it tastes like crap. I like the cake.

I think your final cake was amazing!! I'm glad it turned out....I hope you don't take this the wrong way, but when I saw the post and read that you were the author, it gave me hope, because if these things happen to you (an amazing decorator), then maybe it's not just me who has disasters ! Now if I could only learn how to turn my disasters into gorgeous cakes, I'd be all set!

The cake turn out beautiful!! Hope he will be beter very soon!!

I hope & pray for a very quick recovery for the little man.

I wish my disasters could look that good!!

Oh Nati, I hope he's feeling better. I had to hospitalize my daughter once for a week, bc of dehydration with the awful bug she caught, definately no fun for anyone. Please let us know how he's doing, will you? And when he's better, you can bake him another cake to celebrate.

Thanks guys. JJ is actually feeling better, and is home. He spent a night in hospital with a tube down his nose to rehydrate him. My sister said he cried and cried. Poor bubs, he's not usually a cry baby.
We are planning to have a birthday picnic for him in November, i will make him something cute that he can sink his *few* little teeth into : )
Cheers
Nati

Sure glad JJ is better!

It is really scary for those little guys to go into the hospital, and mom is so upset that he gets that message and it makes them feel more scared! Too many unfamiliar faces, smells and sounds for comfort, and not just for the kids!

Now auntie can relax too! Janice

That is such a cute cake! I was thinking exactly the same as mlynnb-that if someone such as Nati who makes cakes of absolute perfection has disasters once in awhile, there is hope for the rest of us! Thank you so much for sharing. I'm glad little JJ is feeling better.

I am so glad to hear he is doing well. It's so much harder on the little ones when they're sick. My son also had to be hospitalized when he was a baby for dehydration. It broke my heart.

It's amazing how fast they bounce back from being dehydrated. Hope he gets to enjoy his cake in November! Will you make him the most awesome smash cake ever?

Thanks Diana
JJ's birthday was on the 19th of October 06. This was an old thread. We had planned to have a party for him on the 19th of November, had invites out and everything and then his paternal grandfather got really sick and we had to cancel it all together.
Maybe this year we can have a catch up party and awesome cake
Nati