Coolest Octupus Birthday Cake 18

by Paulena
(Kingston, NH)

Homemade Octupus Birthday Cake

I made Octupus Birthday Cake for my son's 6th birthday. He helped with the decorating, so it’s really over the top!

The base is 2 x 12 in rounds; the middle is 2 x 10 in rounds made with the butter cake recipe found on the Wilton's site. I filled it with pastry cream and fresh sliced strawberries and used 3 dowels for stability and frosted with blue buttercream.

The "coral" is Rice Krispie treats. The fish and sea creatures were made a week ahead using candy molds and Merkens colored melting wafers, and stored at RT in a Tupperware. Some fish I mounted on wire to give some movement to the cake, but the wire I chose was a little too soft and so the effect wasn’t as good as I had hoped.

The octopus was a cupcake covered with fondant, the inspiration came from the ocean 11 cake made by Pam R. from Champaign IL (she did a beautiful job - I need a lot more practice working with fondant!!). The eel (on the back side of the cake) and the sharks I sculpted from fondant, and the sharks were supported on bamboo skewers to appear as if they were circling the reef.

Seaweed was made from fruit leather and the candy rocks I purchased from a local chocolate shop.
This cake was a huge personal success and my son said it was the best birthday cake in the whole world!