making a unicorn cake help please!

[5madthings]

So madthing5 has decided she wants a unicorn cake for her 4th bday in a few weeks.

Having googled I think my best bet is to make something like this and add a horn and wings. Horn is easy an ice cream cone cut to size and covered with roll out icing. Wings to lay flat on the body also out if roll out icing, feather shapes and stuck on?

What shapes should I do the basic shapes for body and head? Rectangular for body and trim to shape? Then two regular 8" round cakes for head and trim and use scraps to make head shape and mould it all with butter icing before covering?

Have seen fab mane and tail made out of roll out icing planted together so I think that's easyish.., oh God this will be a nightmare?

How far in advance can I make the mane and tail and wings etc?

Where is the best place to buy multipacks of coloured roll out icing, I am going to need pinks, purples, orange, red and blues and greens? But not loads of each.

I have found multi packs of coloured roll out chocolate fondant, would that work?

I want to make bits like this for the mane and tail maybe?

Bump for evening to see if anyone has any ideas!

Unicorn came topper tutorial here

Cake topper, even...

Thankyou! I have tried to suggest. A unicorn on top of a cake but madthing5 insisted the whole cake must be a unicorn...

A whole one, or could you get a way with a head?

Either way, I think I would google horse cakes and then adapt from there

Not allowed to just be a head and yes I have been googling horses, a horse lying down I think and then I will add wings and a horn!

Like this but with a horn and wings

Hi mad thing

Roll out fondant doesn't always keep its shape very well. Modelling paste will but it can be expensive to buy in all the colours.

The picture shows a slightly easier to carve cake as it's basically a round cake and then bits added on including the head but depends on how big you want your cake to be.

If you are going to carve a cake it has to be a dense sponge such as Madeira rather then a light sponge or you will really struggle and freezing it for a bit can help if you are doing a complicated shape.

Also if you want to make life easier don't bother with the wings as unicorns don't have them, it's pegasus that does. I know if you google unicorn cakes there's an amazing one with wings but that's showing off!

Don't make one like this

No wings needed for a unicorn!

Masthing5 is insisting on wings I was just going to make them out of icing an dlay them flat against the body iyswim?

I will have a look at Madeira recipes. I have a rectangular cake tin, two of those to make the body shape? Then round sponges or maybe even a loaf tin to then make the head. Ffs why do I do these things?

Origionally she wwanted a dinosaur, that was easy loads of online templates etc!

Ooh squeaky that one looks an easier shape to make!

If you want it to have legs, mini rolls would probably be a good size. Or Swiss rolls unwound to the desired thickness. Plus you would get to eat the extra. Both options could be covered in a layer of icing.

For wings you could always make them out of card,with or without real feathers attached.

Genius idea re mini roll legs!

My friend makes cakes and she would make the horn from fondant icing and hold it in place with a wooden skewer. Although ice cream cone sounds good.

Just bake round or square cakes doesn't matter and cut bits off to shape it afterwards and cover with fondant icing.

I have drawn up some templates and am thinking rectangular cake for body trimmed to shape and one half of a hemisphere tin for the base of the head shape and will have to add the snout/nose.

Have managed to order some party bits like pin the horn on the unicorn etc.

Also remembered unicorn poo biscuits, they look easy to make though all the recipies I can find are American so if anyone can find a UK link that would be great, or I shall just have to try and adjust the UK measurements. It's basically what Americans call sugar biscuits with food colouring added.

Oh and today I need to order a new element for our big oven, we have a double oven, one big and one small. The element has gone in the big oven and the little oven isn't a fan oven and is a bit crap for baking cakes. Then dp can fit it! Party on 6th Dec so I have time to get the bits I need and maybe do a trial run to see how to carve the shape.

Think if I make the cakes on the Wed and crumb coat and carve it Thu then decorate Fri evening. I can keep it in the fridge Thu night once crumb coated so then it will be easier to cover in the ready roll icing on Friday.

Going to see if I can pick up a silicone mould for feather shapes, if I makeyboard a flat wing shape out of roll out icing and then cover that in icing feathers that should work.

The tail and the mane are basically just coloured icing rolled into long sausages and maybe swirl them round some pencils to make them curly. What can go wrong?!

I think something like this would be ok to make, but with wings obviously. I was going to use roll out icing to cover but this looks like just butter icing? How have they got that pattern/effect?

Having conferred with a friend I think it's royal icing not butter icing. Am going to do a little cake and do a practise run for technique.

I have a 9" square cake pan to do the body, it's 3" deep what quantity Madeira mix would I need?

1.25 of an 8" recipe according to my book but I would do 1.5 as it's easier to have too much then too little. It does look like royal icing which you can peak with the back of a spoon, don't forget some edible glitter or lustre spray to make it look magical!

Oh yes I have edible glitter etc, plus silver spray that I can use for the unicorn horn, will cover ice cream cone and spray silver.

We have a fabulous cookshop in town that I am going to have a nosey in, just for a look and to get the roll out icing for mane and tail. The shop is like Aladdins cave1, a treasure trove of baking stuff you never knew you needed! It's called looses cookshop.

Unicorn poop biscuits! They are very tasty!