the edible cage

thoughts of: Melissa Chan
day: friday may 23, 2008
time: noon

i am sitting at work right now trying to figure out how to make giant edible fence. of all the things one could possibly be thinking of on a friday before the weekend. we have a birthday cake tomorrow for one of my dear friends and the theme is UFC aka. Ultimate Fighting Championship. The cake will be a fenced in octagon (which is the ring that they fight in). We have been brainstorming but have hit a plateau if you will. we are thinking of making the cage in royal icing, letting it harden and then standing it up against the sides. i wonder if the icing will be to heavy since its not lying flat. i would suppose it couldn't be very tall either or else the weight of it would make it fall inwards. i was also thinking that we could via royal icing, fasten chocolate dipped pretzels to the meeting sides of the "fence"for support. other ideas for a cage (not to be mistaken for a fence because the thought of pretzels and shoestring licorice candy did dance into my head...). i feel like i need to take a trip to bulk barn and see what kind of wafer-like, criss-cross- like edible, and delicious material we can chocolatify and use as a fancy decoration.

There is a lot that goes into these cakes. Forget planning, its a lot of math actually. Measuring ingredients, formulating and re-formulating recipes, conversions (those are the most fun)... We have already outlined how big the cake is. What I still need to figure out is how wide and high each side is going to be...10" circular cake with 8 sides -- anyone want to take a guess? while that is brewing in the brain, i first i will attempt 2 things. #1 - how to make royal icing on my own and then how to dye it black (tip: always always wear gloves whenever working with ANY kind of dye. hair dye, make-up and face staining dyes...food colouring dye...). #2 - how to freehand pipe a cage like fence (dimensions are still unknown).

we have googled some different UFC cakes apparently we are not the only ones who thought the octagon would be a great idea. i think i am against the fighting bloody looking men on top of the cake though. something about that doesn't really relay happy birthday vibes to me.