The kids love me making birthday cakes for them. However, when we are looking for cake inspiration in the weeks (or months) before their birthday, there is a proviso involved in the occasion. That is: the cake has to be within Dad and Mum’s capabilities. Be kind kids! We often explore the classic Australian Women’s Weekly Children’s Birthday Cake Book, or if nothing hits the mark there, we get inspiration from the internet.
My daughter who recently turned 10 wanted a treasure chest cake. There are a lot of different versions on the net, some more challenging than others. I put this together and it turned out to be simple and achievable. I was going to use KitKat chocolate for the chest, but I found it really tricky to work with and get it to stick to the cake properly so I opted for just icing, and my daughter and I were both really happy with the outcome.
Ingredients used
- Sour straps (for chest lines – liquorice strips would work well too)
- Silver sugar pearls
- Nice biscuits (crushed for sand)
- Chocolate coins
- Other bits and pieces we found like plastic gems, a sword, and a mini key
- Icing (I made buttercream icing) – brown/white (no colour)/blue
- Chocolate letters (found these in the baking aisle)
- Rectangle cake for base (any flavour)
- Smaller cut section of cake smaller enough to sit on the base
- Make an approximate diagonal line on the base cake and decorate one part with white icing, and the other with the blue.
2. Place about 4 biscuits in a zip lock bag and crush until fine with a rolling pin.
3. Sprinkle the “sand” over the vanilla icing and make a few wave marks with a fork in the blue part.
4. Cut the treasure chest cake part to size. You need one part of the base, one for the lid, and a few bits of cake for the middle to hold it open. It can be helpful to use a few toothpicks to hold it together before icing. Ice the chest with chocolate icing BEFORE you place it on the base cake. Once completely iced, I used a flip utensil to carefully lift and arrange it on the base cake in place.
5. Next is the fun part! Decorating! Cut small strips of liquorice or sour strips to place 2 lines on the top of the treasure chest. Fill it with coins, edible pearls, gems or anything else. I also added chocolate letters (10) to the chest and the name on the side of the cake.
Ended up being achievable!
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