The Most Extreme Cake I'll Ever Make (Probably): Arcade Cake

I hadn't really planned to go into my baking on this blog, mostly because it's something I do sporadically at best, whenever I get in the mood, or for special occasions, such as my son's birthday party.

And I've done this for every one of his birthdays since he turned three, whenever he wanted me to (most of the time):

His 5th birthday! I didn't know what I was doing so I basically
"colored" with icing and outlined in black.

6th birthday--I had the birthday message on another cake.

7th birthday! This was my first exploration in fondant. Which
is fun stuff and everyone should play with it.

8th birthday. Phoenix actually got to work with me on this one.

10th birthday--my first time covering an entire cake in
fondant and using gum paste. It's sloppy but still fun.

Last year, Phoenix's 11th birthday. We had a bacon party.

So while these were never just average cakes, and they always matched whatever party theme Phoenix chose, they were not the crazy thing I decided I needed to take on this year.

This year, Phoenix chose to have his party at a really awesome local retro arcade, and when I asked what kind of cake he wanted, he said, "An arcade game?"

It was a question, not a statement. If you look at the cakes above, none of them are structurally challenging. I have never done anything like a fancy tiered cake or even anything that had more than two layers. But I have yet to let mere things like lack of knowledge, experience, or even a basic idea for an approach stop me. I've watched Food Network (a lot, actually--it's one of my favorite things to have on in the background while I'm grading, planning, studying, etc.). I've imagined making fancy cakes before. I'm a whiz at Google. So I decided to work through possible steps and come up with a plan.

This was three weeks out from his birthday party. I spent the first week of that co-leading a teaching workshop and passing out from exhaustion every day when I got home.

Math and quilting skillz: useful for
cake!

The second week I started thinking about the cake, how to approach the cake, and how I should start that week so everything would be done early and I could just calmly throw the thing together the day before his party. I even started researching things like how long gum paste takes to dry, whether or not I wanted to make my own gum paste (the answer was no--too many specialized ingredients), similar things other people have done, images of the arcade game my son chose (Donkey Kong), and ways to create the imagery as authentically as possible. I did lots of research. I didn't start a thing.

I was scared. This was a really, really big task. I didn't even know where to start.

Finally, that weekend, I measured my cake pans (to be sure they were 8"x8") and used algebra (I love math! It's so convenient) to convert the measurements from my images of the Donkey Kong machine to a piece of baking parchment. I also used my quilting grid and quilting ruler for this, which both came in really handy.

After measuring like crazy, I realized I needed to buy gum paste so I could actually get started, and somehow still didn't get around to that until the Monday before my son's party. (There's a theme here. Don't procrastinate with gum paste.)

I wanted gum paste because it dries much harder than fondant. The three main cake covers for decorating are icing, fondant, and gum paste. Icing stays generally soft and pliable; fondant eventually dries and becomes brittle if not taken care of, but stays pliable longer than gum paste which makes it good for many things but a poor choice for structural needs; and gum paste dries very hard and solid if you give it enough time, and lasts a long time (you can make your pieces of gum paste up to a month ahead of time if you bother to plan ahead), making it ideal for structural and decorative elements.

I used my measurements to create a pattern, which I cut out of parchment paper. I rolled out the gum paste around 1/4" thick (inconsistently, however, due to reasons). I'll get into the nitty-gritty of how much I used of each thing below in case you want that kind of detail. I then laid my pattern on the gum paste and used a pizza cutter (a trick I learned from Alton Brown a long time ago) to cut around the shape. I cut out two shaped sides that way. The other pieces were simple measurements, so I used the quilting ruler again to measure and give me a straight edge for cutting. I set all the pieces aside to dry and looked forward to getting started on decorating them the next day.

Except that they weren't dry the next day. Because when you have a piece of gum paste that is 16"x8"x0.25" it takes at least a week to dry properly. Awesome. I had four days. And I needed to decorate it in those four days.

So my house became gum paste drying central. It was spread anywhere I could find space and a fan.

The penny's so you can see the size.

And I went ahead and worked on the fondant section of my cake, because I could at least do that. I had decided that the screen of the arcade cabinet would be a fondant version of a screen shot I found online. Since the details were so small, I used texture to create the feel of the beams and ladders of the game, and painted the other details using food coloring very small before carving them from the fondant and attaching them to the "screen".

All the little triangles were made with a toothpick as were the rungs on the ladders. I got better as I went.

By Thursday evening I decided that I couldn't wait for the gum paste to dry completely before painting on it, so I went ahead and started. I would like to thank all of the wonderful people who host and post on cake decorating forums, especially Wilton and Cake Central, because I learned from both sources two important things: how to paint with food color (without it staying sticky) and how to make structural items stick (explained below).

Apparently, alcohol is the magic ingredient for cake painting. The higher the alcohol content, the better the evaporation, which means beautifully dried "paint" on the gum paste or fondant. Most people use vodka (which I also chose), some use everclear (gross), and some, who obviously have more money than I do (and I spent a lot on this cake), use lemon extract, which has a high alcohol content (higher than vodka) but doesn't scare people who don't understand chemistry.

Another forum post suggested that I create a light outline of my design on the gum paste to follow while I'm painting, because it can be erased using just pure clear alcohol (as can pretty much any of the other colors--that's how I made the lines and bolts for the details on the beams).

I was not able to avoid brushstrokes on my finished images, but I'm okay with that, and I think that short of learning to airbrush, that's just the way it goes.

My crazy workstation and mug o' vodka.

Partway through-it's messy before
the outlines.

The outlines made all the difference!

I finished one side the first night--it took me five hours. To be fair, that was partly because I had no idea what I was doing. I approached it like water color: lightest color first, then slowly through increasingly dark colors. It seemed to work, so I followed the same pattern the next evening when I finished painting everything else.

The day before my son's party, I wasted a lot of time figuring out that I couldn't use the same approach to paint the other side of the gum paste pieces black. A lot of time. As in, the entire day. So I had one side of the arcade painted and everything else was trying to dry black but was a really streaked gray color. I finally caved and went and bought the Wilton black cake spray and spray painted it all, which was really messy but effective and dried faster.

However, the end result was that I didn't get to start painting the other pieces until about 6 P.M. the night before I had to produce a finished cake.

I did spend the day baking the three and a half cakes I needed to build the base of the machine. Which was good. Because I didn't finish painting the fancy bits until 2 A.M.

Layer and layer and dowel
rods for stability.

Then, basing my action on things I've seen Duff Goldman and others do on T.V. (I'm a Food Network geek in addition to all the usual geekdoms), I used cardboard supports and dowel rods to create some level of structure to the cake (also layered with icing), including a section that needed an overhang. I also did my best to carve the "screen" at a reasonable angle, covered the stuff in icing, and added a thin layer of black fondant to the top section and blue fondant to the bottom or base of the machine. Lastly, before I passed out at 5:30 A.M, I stuck the sides on the cake and supported them. I also took a picture, in case the sides collapsed, and went to take a two hour nap.

When I woke up with a panicked "What if the sides did collapse and the cake is a failure and my son is going to have the worst birthday ever?!" I dragged myself back to the cake and worked on the rest of the details. I made fondant buttons and a gum paste and fondant joystick. I made the coin slot panel and learned that in order for the Wilton silver spray to actually look silver, you actually need to spray it on a gray fondant (otherwise it looks pearly). Then, with the help of my husband, since I hadn't conveniently grown a third arm in the two hours I'd slept, I attached the back of the arcade. This is where the other piece of advice I'd gained from the forums really saved me. They suggested using candy melting wafers as glue (instead of icing or the various other normal means of attaching gum paste) for things that were structurally difficult.

I would have never succeeded had I not read that.

I melted some wafers in a ziplock baggie and clipped the corner (thanks Alton Brown!) so I could pipe a controlled stream into the corners where the pieces of gum paste met. I used my finger to smooth the line (like I do when I caulk--this was really just like caulking). Then I took a picture. Then my husband held the top sign of the arcade to the front of the "sides" of the arcade and I piped that together too. I held it until I was sure it was cool enough to be stable. And I took another picture. I was really scared the whole thing would fall apart so I wanted proof that I had gotten as far as each step.

I added the fondant screen. And I took a picture.

I added the joystick and button section. And I took a picture.

I set my husband the task of wiring a light behind the front sign of the arcade. I didn't take a picture because I didn't want to annoy him.

I added the coin slot and the black band of fondant (mostly there to break up the blue). And I took a picture.

You don't really need all of those pictures. They may even be considered excessive by some. Instead, may I present to you, with a lot of build up, The Most Extreme Cake I'll Ever Make (Probably):

Front view with the light off. Yes, I know the fit is wonky. That's
explained below. I was frustrated.

Side view without the light.

Front view with the light. The blue really made it seem like the screen
was glowing.

Side view with the light. You can see a little of the glow behind the
sign, which helped sell the effect, I think.

Things I learned the hard way (aside from "never procrastinate when gum paste is on the line"):

1. Don't dry gum paste on parchment paper. It just wrinkles from the moisture, which then translates to waves in the dried gum paste (see lit side view of cake above). I recommend silicon or foam.
2. Cake shrinks when it cools. I knew that, really, but hadn't thought to apply that knowledge to this particular cake that required pretty much exact measurements to work correctly. Thus, instead of an 8"x8" cake, mine was 7"x7" which made the fit a little (lot) off. I was able to clip one piece of gum paste with lots of sawing and careful breaking, but that would have ruined the design of the top sign so it stayed oversized.
3. Some people suggest speeding up gum paste drying by setting it in your oven with the light on (without actually turning the oven on). I tried that on a few pieces, and one ended up cracking. My pieces were huge, though, so I don't know if it works for smaller pieces.
4. I have a long way to go in cake carving.

Things I am inspired to do thanks to this cake:

1. Any simple decorating. I'm serious. After that cake, I feel like all the others were breezes.
2. A cake painting party. I could make small cakes, cover them in blank white fondant, and everyone could paint whatever they wanted on it. And there'd be vodka. For painting.
3. Light-up edible gum paste art. It doesn't show in the pictures, but the light was visible through the 1/3" gum paste sign. So cool. So edible. So lit up.

Supplies I personally needed so I could stumble my way through making this cake:

Six bags of Wilton gum paste (around $9 each): $54
One bag of Wilton white fondant (not the pre-rolled: around $7): $7
Four packages of cake mix (around $3 each): $12
Four tubs of icing (around $2 each): $8
One collection of gel food color (which will be useful in the future, but I'm counting it): $13
One bottle of Gray Goose Vodka (trust me, good quality means less fumes): $35--but I only used half, so $17
Cake dowels: $2
Cardboard cake supports: $3
Black and Silver icing sprays ($3 each): $6
Black candy melting wafers: $3

This doesn't count things I already had on hand, like paint brushes dedicated to edible decorating, a cake leveler, a cake display board, the wiring and such for the light, etc.

So for expenses only based on things I didn't have, this cake cost me $125 to make. Good thing I have an understanding and supportive spouse. And good thing this is only once a year.

The cake survived the drive to the site! And the cake was not a lie!
It was chocolate and delicious!