Would Welcome Advice For Decorating A Train Cake...
Decorating By Kookiefool Updated 23 Sep 2005 , 9:05am by Kookiefool
First, I"m new (to here and to cake decorating), and would like to say hi to everyone, and thank you for being here with help and to share with!
I have promised a choo choo train cake this Sunday to a friend's grandson for his 4th birthday, and am planning on using the basic instrucitons for a cake I found on Disney's family fun site as a guide, with some changes and additions of my own. I would greatly appreciate any advice you may have on how to make some of my ideas work, as well as any ideas you might also have.
First, since the cake is made up of a few box cars, I was thinking of covering the cardboard base with parchment and decorating that too. I was going to use green icing for grassy areas and beige for "ground" that would contain the train on a track made up of black string licorice. Would I be better off with just using a brown frosting to pipe on the tracks? Would that be a better, more secure idea? If not, would dots of royal or regular icing work as a glue?
And any ideas other than plan frosting put on with a rough texture to give the impression of grassy and ground-like areas? Or do you think that would be adequate.
I also made some sugar cookie trees that I plan to decorate with royal icing to stand up on the background. To make them stand securely, I had planned to put a small circle of cake in the spot, adhere it with some decorator's icing (wilton recipe), cover it with brown icing for the bark, and stick the cookie into that with some frosting to secure it. Any ideas you think would work better?
Third, I was going to use a pound cake recipe (both vanilla and chocolate) for the cars since my thought is that it is a firm cake, and would not only be easy to handle, but also easy to cut out a center section from to create a boxcar (which I plan to fill with tootsie roll "logs", and other things). Would anyone have a recipe for a cake that would hold up well, or do you think a basic pound cake recipe would suffice?
And if anyone has any other ideas or suggestions they think would be fun, I"d love to hear them.
Thanks in advance for your help. If this project does come off without any catastrophic events, and if I don't have to end up running out and buying a cake because it was a disaster, and if the 5 5-week old kittens I am fostering do not jump all over the cake before I deliver it, I will try to take and post a picture of it! This is my 3rd attempt at cake decorating (I've done a care bear and a whale cake), but sadly was not able to get pictures of those. Wish I had.
PS: In return, in the recipe section, in response to a request for ideas for cake scraps, I have posted a recipe for cake truffles, a version of the cake balls others here have been talking about.
PPS: If curious, the link to the cake I am using as a basic guide is http://familyfun.go.com/recipes/family/feature/famf58cakes/famf58cakes5.html
FIRST I WOULD LIKE TO SAY WELCOME TO CC KOOKIEFOOL. HOPE THAT YOU WILL LOVE IT HERE AS MUCH AS I DO. CAN'T WAIT TO SEE THE PICTURES OF YOUR CAKE. I WENT TO THE LINK AND SAW WHAT YOU GOING TO MAKE. I WOULD JUST USE BROWN TO MAKE THE TRAIN TRACKS INSTEAD OF TRYING TO "FASTEN" THE LICORICE DOWN TO THE PARCHMENT. IT WOULD BE A WHOLE LOT EASIER THIS WAY. I THINK THAT THE GREEN AND BEIGE WOULD BE A GREAT IDEA FOR THE GRASS AND THE GROUND. ALSO IF YOU HAVE TO TIME, YOU COULD BREAK UP GRAHAM CRACKERS SO THEY WERE CRUSHED TO MAKE THE GROUND - JUST A THOUGHT. I WOULD THINK THAT THE POUND CAKE IS A GREAT CAKE TO GO WITH. GOOD LUCK!
Welcome to Cake Central, Kookiefool!
First of all, I would cover the cake board with marshmallow fondant. It's really easy to use, and it would give you a "stickier" base than parchment. Everything slides so easily off of parchment, I would be nervous that any decorations would slide around. You could also color it any color you want, which means you could have a green background and just a few clumps of grass piped with tip 233 for a 3-D feel. Then either use BC or MMF for the traintracks. MMF would stick easily with just a little water.
For your recipe, do a search for "durable cake" on the recipe page. I haven't used it myself, but everyone on here seems to love it.
Not quite sure about those trees. Are they single cookies? If they are, I would skip the cake part and just stick them on with royal icing (or MMF if you use that) shaped to look like trunks.
I'm sure it will be a cute cake, and the birthday boy will love it. Good luck, post pics when you're done. 
Ali
Thank you both so much for taking the time to answer.
I love the idea of the graham crackers, and plan to try that. And will use BC as you both suggested for the tracks.
The marshmallow fondant sounds great, but since I am fairly new to this whole thing, I have never made nor used fondant yet (although I hope to learn soon), and would be a bit hesitant to attempt it only because I have only 2 days to make the cake, and not enough time to practice and remake it if I goof. I found recipes and directions for it, and will try to experiement with it soon.
However, in the meantime, you make a very good point about the icing slipping off the parchment.
Since it's just for decoration, and not part of the cake that will be eaten, do you think it will stick better if I just frost the cardboard? Or is there something else that might be easier right now for the base?
Or can I purchase marshmallow fondant, or would regular purchased fondant give the same results?
Boy, have I got a lot to learn. lol
And the cookies will be single cookies, so I will try to use some royal icing as you suggest to attach them. And will try the 233 tip for some clumps of grass. That's a great idea.
Thanks again for your help.
Kookiefool - give the MMF a try - really. It will cost you about $1 in ingredients and only takes a few minutes to make, so not much lost if it doesn't work out. Just roll it out on corn starch. If you just use it for the cakeboard, color it before you mix in the sugar. I wouldn't bother with store-bought fondant, though. It's just too expensive.
I wouldn't ice the cake board, it will just get greasy & soggy, unless you want to use thinned royal icing, which a lot of people do on wedding cakes. Don't know how hard it would be for a large cake board. Other alternatives are to find some wrapping paper or something either plain green or with a grass pattern, wrap your board in that, then cover with contact paper or some other clear plastic (other than plastic wrap, which is easy to cut through when the cake is being cut.).
If you have any other questions, just ask!
Ali
alimonkey,
Okay, I'll be brave and give it a try. I have to learn to use fondant eventually. Worse case scenario, I can maybe form some into puffs of smoke for the smokestack, instead of (or around) the popcorn that was suggested.
And if that doesn't work, your suggestion for thinned out royal icing actually gave me another idea. I might just make an extra recipe of cake, bake it in jellyroll pans, and make a thin frosted cake base to put everything on.
And if nothing works, I'll invite the neighborhood kids in to eat the remains and plead insanity.
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