Leopard Seal Cake
by Tara
(Commack, NY)
I made this cake for my son's 4th birthday. After watching Happy Feet, he had an obsession with the leopard seal and requested a leopard seal cake.
I copied a photo of a leopard seal from a "sea life" book, put the outline under a piece of wax paper and traced the outline onto the wax paper with white writing icing. Once completed, I placed the wax paper outline in the fridge for a few minutes to firm up and then inverted it onto the top of the cake and pressed down lightly to transfer the image onto the top of the cake. Once on the cake, I just filled it in with buttercream.
The cake was a box mix, but the frosting was from scratch--a buttercream meant for piping. The tongue was red gel icing and the teeth were marshmallows. The "leopard" dots and the eye were chocolate chips.
Around the side of the cake I made 4 penguins and a "good luck" duck out of homemade marshmallow fondant (he also loves ducks). My son wondered what kind of duck lives in the Arctic :)
