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22Aug
How to Make an Awesome Castle Cake
I blogged about a month ago about how much I hate craft and suck at it. I genuinely did mean it.
At the same time my daughter’s birthday was approaching, and I thought I would *try* to make her a castle cake. My Mum always made amazing sweet/candy/lolly decorated cakes, cottages, castles, whatever we were into at the time. It’s one of those memories that you appreciate more when you’re older and know how much work it must have been. So I challenged myself to try.
I did a practice run to see what shapes I could make. It did not go well:
Oh Dear.
I pretty much abandoned the idea and skulked out of the kitchen. Later on, I started googling images for ‘castle cake’ and felt pretty fed up. They were all made of ‘sugarpaste’ (fancy term for rolled icing) and I’d never tried it, and it looks impossible. THEN, I looked at how-to Youtube videos and thought, actually, broken down into steps, nothing about it looked that scary.
I might bake three cakes a year (and one might be presentable), and have never made a birthday cake, but after a few evenings of consulting Professor Google and the kind bakers who share their tips, ideas and skills on t’internet, I made this:
My daughter was thrilled, and I must admit that despite my anti-craft stance generally, I really enjoyed doing it and was very chuffed with the result! As a birthday cake it is ridiculous, excessive and over the top, and I clearly got carried away, but once I got going nothing about it was really very complicated at all. Each step was easy and a bit like doing playdoh so very straightforward. Aside from baking a basic victoria sponge (google ‘victoria sponge delia’ for the recipe) the decorating took two evenings, so about 8 hours.
I thought I would blog it a) because I’m proud of it and b) it’s so much easier than it looks I want to share if anyone else is looking for ideas
I’ll just do a very brief version in images:
After baking the sponge I started cutting out the decorations from thinly cut sugarpaste, as they needed to dry out. (I just used a plunger cutter)
I dried cut out butterflies on folded paper so their wings stood out
Make a paper template for the cones then cut out icing and glue to cones, smoothing over with the tool.
Butter icing on a chilled cake is easier (less crumbs) and something for the sugarpaste to stick to. (Turn the cake upside down for a neater edge)
Stop and have a drink – this takes a while
Cover the cakes in sugarpaste – check youtube if you haven’t done this before – it’s easy peasy
Print on the brick pattern (I got a mould off ebay)
Cover and print on swiss rolls for main turrets
Assemble cakes and start to glue on detail like doors to get symmetrical
Lay it all out prior to gluing (I broke three turrets doing this wrong)
Use wooden skewers for supports (the top tubes are cardboard not cake – shhh – nobody noticed!)
Sit down with a large glass of wine, edible glue and the little cutouts and get sticking! I made thin slices of green with a steak knife for the ivy and squished together stars to make leaves.
- Add sprinkles to the board and flags and ta-da!! A fairytale castle
Simples. Probably cost me £40-50. Professionally made would easily have been double that. Would I do it again? Sure! I have three daughters, so will try and make something for each. But nothing else, ever!!!
Ingredient and tool list at the end of the post…
JT
PS. If you have made your cake using this guide please feel free to email your pics to contact@inadifferentvoice.co.uk and I will share them on the end of the post!
INGREDIENTS AND TOOLS
For Cake:
10 inch victoria sponge
7 inch victoria sponge
Buttercream to fill
Jam/jelly to fill
5 ready-made tesco value chocolate swiss rolls (the kids preferred these!) for the bottom pillars
Box of waffle conesFor Decorations:
2kg ivory sugarpaste
750g pink sugarpaste
100g green sugarpaste
Shimmery baubles (edible)
Edible glue
Meadow colour sprinkles (for cake base)
(I got all these from an online cake supplies shop)Equipment:
20 inch plastic rolling pin (got mine on amazon)
Icing smoother (ebay)
large cake board
wooden skewers (to position towers)
Cardboard tube (for top towers) – I used a wrapping paper inner tube
Flower and star cutters (ebay)
Little brush for glueReaders’ Cakes!
Good work from Allie – loving the little path! (Dec 2012)
Next up, a medieval ‘Mike the Knight Cake’ from Laura. She made some great practical modifications – the main cake was a 10″ square and a 7″ round Madeira as they are firmer, and the top towers are mini rolls:
Then comes Farhana’s ‘Cinderella Cake’ – fantastic use of edible glitter on the spires and nice colour choice too
(Nov 2012)
Next up from Emma, is a version of the original without the top towers but with deeper base cakes, which works really well! (Feb 2013)
And also from Mrs Dixon who has used pillars of equal size which give it a wonderful fuller figure (Feb 2013):
Thank you to everyone who has submitted them so far – please keep them coming!!
Discussion 43 Responses
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That is quite possibly the prettiest DIY castle cake I’ve see in a while. I am 27 now but I am still asking my mom for one for my next birthday!
Thanks – I think I would still do it if mine asked at 27!!
Amazing! x
Wow Jane!! I am just soo impressed!!! May try this for my daughter’s birthday coming up in November!! ABSOLUTELY FAB!!! XXX
Do it!! We enjoyed eating the disasters too
Thankyou!
Hi,what did you use to make the wooden design on the door?
A wooden imprint mat – it came in a set of two with the brick one
Very impressive!! I don’t dare to show this to my daughter! I’m more of a making-tasty-cakes-rather-than-making-pretty-cakes-kind-of-person (hopefully one day I’ll be able to combine the two!)
Yeah to be fair two kilos of sugarpaste gets a bit samey tasting!
It looks bloody amazing. From your first effort, I was dubious re what the finished cake would look like but it’s amazing. Very professional. Thinking about how I can adapt it to make a knight’s version for my son. He likes pink but not flowers. Maybe add a dragon out the front.
Thanks! You can get grey sugarpaste to easily make it more medieval. Loads of good dragon cakes out there too I’m told! The little plunger cutters make it very easy indeed to cover in ivy etc.
I think if I do grey turrets and then green and red ivy with a couple of dragons, then it would really suit him. Thanks for the tips!
[...] a weird outburst making an OTT birthday cake recently, I am now officially addicted to trying out new things by watching how-to videos online. [...]
I made my kids 4 birthday cake using your design. It came out really really well! Thanks for sharing this!
Fantastic! Email me a pic to contact@inadifferentvoice.co.uk and I’ll add it on the post?!
Good for you! It looks lovely! xx
Wow! This is by far the best tutorial I’ve seen for a castle cake, thank you very much!
[...] a weird outburst making an OTT birthday cake recently, I am now officially addicted to trying out new things by watching how-to videos online. [...]
Hi wow this cake looks fantastic
what size cake Tins did you use and also is the second cake just placed on top or is there supports used? Looking forward to making this myself 
x
Thanks! I used 10″ and 7″ cake tins. No supports between them but I did ice each one separately before assembling which helped stop the bottom one sinking, and made it easy to take apart and cut up. Hope it works well for you too!
I’m going to give this a go so may email you with questions.
Feel free but please don’t rely on me to reply quickly!!
Thank you so much for this, I Made d castle for my niece on Sunday for her third birthday and found it totally stress free with all ur pictures and step by steps, it was so easy to follow, greatly appreciated xxx
That’s lovely to hear! Thanks for posting that!
WOW I’m seriously impressed!
I’m about to embark on the same project and you have given me hope. Your cake looks REALLY professional. I will definately go for it now. WELL DONE
[...] treat them as individuals. Plus since I’d enjoyed trying it last summer for my eldest’s castle cake cake, I was happy to have an excuse to play with sugar paste [...]
Just done my own version of this… Totally copied your advice … Wish I could post a pic x
Hi Alice, You can email it to contact@inadifferentvoice.co.uk and I will add it on to the post! I’d love to see it!
I have emailed you. Thanks so much for showing me how !
Wouldn’t have been able to do it with out you pics xx
Wow! Thanks for sharing. After a year or so of making cakes for friends and family, I’ve decided to try and make some money from it, after a friend saw one of my recent cakes of a horse, I was asked if I could make a fairy castle. So glad I stumbled across your blog, I’d always been too scared to try it before (think it was the turrets that did it) I now feel more confident.
Will be investing in the embossing mat for sure.
Thanks again. xx
Hi there – I was thinking of doing this with my son for a history project. Obviously we would ‘man it up’ a bit with greys / browns and blacks and maybe leave the flowers out! Wish us luck and if it’s a success I’ll send you a pic
Hehe – flowers can be manly too!! Although for historical accuracy a medieval version wouldn’t be pink and white! (mine was made to madam’s specifications, never let a three-year-old give consultancy advice on history haha!)
My daughter decided on a castle cake for her 5th birthday and I am so grateful I came across this blog!! Made the cake and it was a great success. I wouldn’t have had a clue where to start, thank you so much for putting this up and giving us give it a go mums a massive head start! Xx
This is amazing! Thank you for providing me with the inspiration to make my own [http://kialtho.wordpress.com/wp-admin/post.php?post=647&action=edit&message=6&postpost=v2]
I would send you a photo for your blog but it’s all tied up in photobucket!
Also, yours is amazing. Mine looks like a rather mediocre attempt in comparison, but regardless I am pleased with how this turned out
hello,
this cake is wonderful …. I would like to try it but I can not find the mold for bricks … even on ebay. can you give me the link to what you bought?
thanks
Hi Carla, I found a few brick pattern moulds for cakes by searching for ‘bark and brick impression mat’ on eBay – they are there somewhere! I hope that helps!
Thank you so much for this tutorial, I have just made this cake for my daughter’s birthday, she asked for a princess castle cake, she is 23!!!! x
OMG’s you have created a monster! What a good idea, I thought to myself – my son is 4 on Thursday, he’s bang into his Knights and Castles. Why not??? I’m now on day 3 of this epic adventure. Had a few hiccups. Cake drum did not arrive, so having to use a much smaller one from lakeland and have had to cut the corners off my 10 inch square base cake in order to fit the turrets on. I also seriously under estimated the amount of butter cream I needed (my cakes are HUGE!) And didn’t think it would take me quite so many years to finish it. I believe Windsor castle took less time. Probably stone henge as well. Am about to ice the swiss rolls and assemble! Pics to follow!
Hiya, I’m going to attempt to make this but just wanted a little advise.
Did you fondant wrap the whole cake including the bottoms? Or just the bits the eye can see, so the top and sides. Also I’m worried about the fondant softening once it’s finished and left. I need it for a Sunday afternoon, but I am out the day before in the evening. When would you suggest to make it? I was thinking bake Friday, Crumb coat Saturday and fondant the big bits and then finish Sunday morning? Do you think that would work? By the way the cake is FAB!
Thanks for sharing:). Your castle looks amazing and I will follow your tutorial. It will be a combination of my big girl’s 3 year birthday and my little girl’s christening. With a little baby on top I think it will be possible
I just made this for my friends daughters 5th birthday party and she loved it! Thought you might like to add a photo to your blog so I’ve emailed you over one! Thanks for the breakdown on how to do it. Although I didn’t really rely on it that much as I just used your main photo. I varied it a tad by spraying it with pearl lustre spray and adding flowers around the base. I got lots of compliments on it and the little princess loved it, so thank you so much for the inspiration!
Definitely going to use this when making my niece her castle cake in July! Excellent cake x