Barbie/doll cake - recipe needed!

[MooMinCow]

Will be attempting one of these next week for DD's 4th bday. Can someone give me a definitive recipe for a 1 litre Pyrex pudding bowl please? The recipes I've googled are all vague about quantities, how far up I should be filling bowl (don't fancy scraping sponge batter off the oven!), and cooking times. I appreciate that it is harder to judge times as cake needs to cook right through to middle - would I need to cover with foil half way so it doesn't burn on top? TIA

I made one of these using a pudding bowl and a normal 3 inch deep 8 inch across cake tin, in order to get enough height for the skirt/legs without having to fill basin so deeply you don't get the middle cooked. Best way to be sure of sizing/quantity is put water into whatever tin you usually use and then transfer water into bowl/tin to be used for doll cake, repeating as necessary and keeping count as you go. You can then judge how many "normal" tins go into the special ones and multiply your usual recipe up accordingly. Hope that helps.

sorry, meant 6 inch across cake tin.... or use whatever you have and trim cake once cooked to same diameter as cake cooked in basin.

Thanks Tiger. Can I ask how far I should fill the bowl up? Half or two thirds? Did you cling film the legs and cut out a hole, or just plunge her in (snigger)?

I would fill basin between half and 3/4 full. The added height from the cake tin cake should then be sufficient to make the skirt long enough. I did cling film the legs as I was bit worried about where the doll might have been..... I used roll out fondant icing to dress the "chest" area, or you could use buttercream (snigger indeed...) and the skirt can be butter cream or rolled out icing, depending how creative you feel. Have made loads of fancy cakes in my time covered in rolled out icing and always feel that could actually use play doh as the DCs never seemed to eat the icing anyway!

oh god, don't think I could pipe buttercream over her pneumatic bust, would just feel wrong on so many levels

Agree about the icing - have bought some fondant icing, edible glitter, sweets etc to decorate and I know DD will be far more interested in that then what lurks beneath Barbie's skirt!

out of interest do you use a standard Victoria sponge recipe or a Madeira one? have been thinking about trying Nigella's buttermilk birthday cake recipe (which she claims can support any amount of heavy icing), but have never baked it before, and am wary of trying anything new as will only really have time for one attempt!

Have always used standard madeira for this type of thing. Would stick with tried and tested if i were you, decorating it will be stressful enough! Good luck.