When Mickey Mouse is not so mickey mouse.

Mickey Mouse Birthday Cake

Two weeks ago I was asked to make a Mickey Mouse birthday cake for a close friend’s nephew who was turning 2. I happily accepted because I love to bake and look for any reason to bake and because I finally had an opportunity to make a Mickey Mouse cake; an opportunity I was not easily going to pass up.

I planned to make the Mickey Mouse topper over the weekend, after I had toyed with a few ideas for the cake. I would then bake the cake Thursday evening, dirty ice it so that it can set and then cover it in red butter cream the Friday with an overlay of smarties.

Well, life always seems to get in the way of the best laid plans and by Saturday later afternoon I was a sick as a dog. I spent the weekend in bed! Two days later I was at the doctor being diagnosed amongst, other things, with upper respiratory tract infection and urinary tract infection and put on antibiotics.

I had gave myself a lecture, allowed my body to rest on Wednesday and told myself come hell or high water I would be better by Thursday.

I was feeling much better on Thursday and managed to bake and dirty ice the cake. It seemed to be going smoothly and I was happy with the result. I started with the Mickey Mouse cake topper made from rice crispy treats.

Mickey Mouse Cake Topper

Come Friday and for some reason the buttercream did not want to work the way I had planned and all my faffing was just making it worst. I was left to cover the cake in fondant. I finished the cake topper off the Friday evening.

I got up early on Saturday to start placing the smarties around the cake – it took about 2 and half hours to do this and I had to go and buy extra smarties! I placed the cake topper on last which was a mistake as it was heavy and caused the icing to settle even more which lead to some of the smarties falling off the cake. The extreme heat in Johannesburg also didn’t really help.

Tip: If you have a heavy cake topper that you need to place on the cake, leave it to rest on the cake after you have dirty iced the cake so that the icing can settle!

All in all, though I really did enjoy making the cake.

It was Baked with Love.