Say it with Cake - Happy Birthday (to me !) GUIDE

Happy Birthday to me

Happy Birthday to me

So ridiculous to make yourself a birthday cake !!

Basically, it was just a good excuse to have a practise run for making Oliver a cake later in the month for when he turns two.

I've NEVER used fondant to cover a cake before - so there was always going to have to be a first time.....

I designed our first Say it With Cake WORD mould (CAKE) a couple of years ago - and it has proven to be very popular with our customers. You can see a guide about it here. A few months ago, I introduced some other word moulds - HAPPY, BIRTH and DAYS.

You can either put the words together to get a HAPPY BIRTHDAY, CAKE DAYS, HAPPY DAYS - or mix and match as I have done to make SARAH. You can easily cut the silicone word cakes up into individual letters for easier use when mix and matching.

I always knew that everyone would want "other" letters to make words and names that these four WORDS moulds cannot complete. The logistics behind producing these has been awkward and very costly.... However, it's been in the pipeline for some months now and you'll be able to get your hands on them soon !

Individual letters and numbers are going to all be available. It will work out a bit more expensive per letter than buying the combined letter sets HAPPY, BIRTH, DAYS and CAKE. Where possible, I'd suggest you might want to start with a core word, chop it up and buy the additional letters required singly. 

The individual letters and number moulds are starting to come out of production. They will not be available for sale until late November and at the moment estimated price will be around £1.50 per letter / number.

Ideal for making personalised cakes. Little effort required, as they look SUPER just dusted with icing sugar and filled with jam and cream. I'm hoping to get my hands on the first ones off production in time to make an "Oliver's 2nd Birthday" cake at the end of this month.... or something along those lines

Do be warned - you'll need to make a cake board from plywood or similar and cover it for more than 4 letters, or opt for acrylic as I've done. I've had a selection of acrylic cake boards made for my own use from Trent Plastics - who will cut to size as required. They were not expensive (this one was just £3.50). To do CONGRATULATIONS which is a really long cake, you would be best to use a 1500mm x 200mm board which in acrylic is just £10.62. Pretty good value if you ask me !

To make the above cake, I cheated a bit. I got some premix from the local commercial bakery to try - it's what they use as a genoise sponge base to make all their celebration cakes. Basically, you just weigh out the premix and add oil and water. Mix with a wooden spoon for a minute or two and it's ready.

It actually tastes great and drastically cuts down the work. I'm thinking about stocking it after Christmas to sell in pre-bagged amounts. It would be ideal for using with big cakes such as the giant muffin and the castle for making birthday cakes - as making massive batches of home made cake mix can be terribly time consuming.

I made up just enough for 6 letters - which gave me one letter to use as a practise piece.

Here is a baked letter B in the mould. Always grease (I like to use butter) and flour the mould before use for easy release.

After the cake has suitably cooled, I used a serrated bread knife and carefully sliced the domed top off to level the underside of the cake, as the bottom should become the top.

I made a template strip from a piece of card the same depth as the mould. After rolling out the fondant, I placed this on top and cut out a big long strip to use for the edges of the cake. I brushed the cake with warm jam and then applied the edges. Letter S was the hardest. I had to use a skewer and a teaspoon handle to coax the fondant into the inside curves of the S.

I then drew round the outside of the silicone letter mould and made a cardboard template of the actual letter. This could then be placed onto fondant to cut out the shape.

After cutting out the letter, I placed it on top of the cake with sides already attached. Using fingertips and some cold water in a bowl - I smoothed over the icing until the joints fused and all but disappeared.

After that, it was time for a little extra decoration with some stamped fondant shapes and edible glitter. My fondant looks a little orange peel like - but I'm sure I'll improve with practise !

 I put the cake in our spare room last night to hide it. Oliver hasn't seen it yet - but he'll love helping to blow out candles later once he gets up. As all the toddlers at nursery have been having birthdays over the last few weeks - he sings Happy Birthday at least several times a day since he's learnt the words and tune :-)

Sarah-Jane Nash (another year older !) - silicone bakeware mould specialist cook shop - http://www.siliconemoulds.com/