2006 Mustang Shelby GT 500 (that's a mouthful!)

Jodie threw a surprise birthday party for her husband and wanted the cake to look like his baby.... his car :) At first I was a little scared because the cake needed to look exact. Ralph loves his 2006 Mustang Shelby GT 500 and if it wasn't exact, he would notice. Here's what I did...

The cake was Brownie Lovers (chocolate cake layered with actual brownies and chocolate ganache) and it was covered in homemade marshmallow fondant. First, I went to the store and bought a small toy replica of the exact car. I had plenty of pictures that Jodie secretly took of the car but I thought a more 3-D replica would help. I started by layering the cake and brownies into a rectangle. I covered it in ganache and then let the ganache harden up a bit before starting the carving process. I carved, stepped back, carved some more, stepped back some more, and carved again. To get the dimensions just right, it took several hours of carving, frosting, and carving to get it right. Once I had that down, I added dimension on the cake like the spoiler and bumpers by rolling MMF and "gluing" them onto the cake with a little ganache. The idea here was to place fondant over these grooves so that they stuck out even further than the cake itself but could stand on their own. Then, I covered the cake in four separate pieces of marshmallow fondant (the front, the back, and the sides). Because this cake was so huge, I thought it best to cover it in pieces so that I could pay more attention to the grooves of each side rather than rushing through covering it quickly. I wanted the cake to shine like a real car so I painted the whole cake with edible red food coloring a few times until it shined. Ah, that was so much fun.

I cut out the windows and inserted black pieces of fondant to mimic tinted (yes, REALLY tinted) windows. I ran white stripes down the center of the cake (which was trickier than it looks because I wanted them to look just right). The wheels were made of rice crispies covered in MMF. I painted the rims with edible silver and waited until they dried before placing them on the cake. I added the rear view mirrors, and tiny details like the headlights, back lights, logos, and license plate. Wow, when I write it out like that, it sounds so easy! :)

When the cake was complete, it was so huge that I couldn't fit it into either of my fridges! To give you an idea, one of the guests of the party insisted on taking a picture of me with my cake (I rarely ever do this but here it is... me and Ralph's cake!).

Since it was a surprise party, I didn't get a chance to meet Jodie or Ralph but Jodie later wrote me this email:

Well, all I can think of to say is WOW. That cake was SOOO incredible! It got photographed more than Ralph did! You are truly amazing.....what was even more amazing was that it was unbelievably delicious! I actually think it was the best cake I ever had! Ralph had a seriously hard time making that first cut into it---in fact he tried his key fob first! I just can't thank you enough--you didn't have any cards left there by the end of the party! I was telling everyone how wonderful you were to work with--I soo appreciated your willingess to dive into the challenge, and it was just as amazing as I knew it would be. It was the hit of the party--there were lots of car guys there that were completely enamored!

Thank you, thank you, thank you again--the care and detail that you put into that work of art was so appreciated. I can't wait to take one of your classes!

Thank you so much, Jodie! I was so thrilled to have such a challenge and it was awesome working with you as well!