Zebra Shoe/Shoe box Cake

I had put a request out on the blog a week or two ago mentioning I wanted to make a stiletto type shoe and shoe box for someone! Well, I got someone who wanted JUST the shoe I wanted to make!! Thank you thank you thank you Jen! This was SO fun to make and had so many firsts for me...it was both a great learning experience and a fun cake to make!


All the zebra stripes were hand painted with edible gel colors. It took me a while to realize that you can water the gel down to a acrylic type consistancy, so after I did that, the painting was a lot smoother. The paint was still a bit wet when I took these pics, so I don't think it would be a shiny when it was dried. But Jen had to pick it up last night, wet and all! :)

The shoe and bow were made of modeling chocolate. I really don't like to use gumpaste (the tissue is made of gumpaste though because I wanted it thin!) because it tastes weird...it's all crunchy! Whereas, I love eating modeling chocolate because it's still soft, but tastes SO good! :) And, if it's thick enough, it holds it shape.

The cake is dark chocolate mudcake with a vanilla ganache filling. This was my first time making a box like this, so getting those corners right was tough! By the end I figured out a good technique, but I ran out of ganache again!! UGH! But, next time, I realized I need to load up the corners with frosting so that when you pull a bench scraper/smoother on them, you can get a nice sharp corner.One more thing...I used Satin Ice fondant for the first time (that was the black shoe box base). And I made/used MMF for the lid. I have to say, I thought they both had the exact same consistancy!!!! Although, the MMF was definetly more forgiving! It didn't give me elephant skin/tearing stretch marks at all...whereas the Satin Ice did! So, I was really excited to be able to have compared them because now I'm definetly sticking with the MMF!!!! Oh, and this last batch I made was a DREAM! I think cooking it slower was the key...it had the perfect consistancy!! I really paid attention to the microwave, and it worked!!!

All in all, I loved this cake and had such a blast making it!! Thank Jen for calling me up and having me do this cake for Ellen Nona!! :)