Giraffe Number Seven cake

I made this Number Seven Giraffe cake for my niece´s seventh birthday, which I took the idea for from Tartas de Fiesta Infantiles by Anne Wilson. I was planning on making my Hot Milk Sponge cake but decided to take a shortcut seeing as I have less time now and -horror of horrors!-used a packet cake mix, Mary Lee American Yellow Sponge cake, which was very quick, easy and delicious. I cooked it in two elongated cake tins and then shaped one to make a rounded face. I think I rounded it a bit too much so it doesn´t quite look as much of a number seven as it should! I then cut a triangle off the other to make it neck shaped, then stuck them together with a little raspberry jam!


This time I tried a different buttercream, Hannah Miles´ buttercream recipe from Big Book of Cakes & Cookies, as usually the buttercream recipe I use doesn´t set, which maybe due to the heat. I coloured the majority of the buttercream yellow and about 1/4 cup of it orange using red and yellow liquid food colouring. Using a palette knife I covered the cake with the yellow buttercream as smoothly as possible but still managed to get crumbs mixed in it. I need to learn how to crumb coat! I then filled a disposable icing bag with the orange buttercream and using a 12 " icing nozzle, piped orange blobs for the giraffe´s spots. For the mane and the giraffe´s mouth,nose and eyes I used sweets such as liquorice and blackberries and voíla a friendly giraffe number seven cake!

I think it was a big hit at my niece´s birthday party as it was soon gobbled up and some kids even went back for seconds or thirds! Next year I think I´ll have to make a bigger cake!!