Mum's Birthday Cake

A dense area of flowers

  My mum had pointed out a chocolate and hazelnut cake she would like for her birthday so I chose to make it. Everything went smoothly and it was similar to my usual recipe but it included milk which made the cake more moist inside!  Whilst the cake was in the oven, I cut out 20 small flowers in two different sizes out of white fondant. Using a ball tool I indented the centre of each flower. Then I left them to set. Once the cake had cooled I whisked cream cheese, margarine and chocolate spread before adding icing sugar and crushed hazelnuts for the filling; It was a bit runny though!  Next I

The chocolate cake

took 500g of white fondant and kneaded in some ordinary green food colouring until it was soft to touch and a mint green colour.
Then I rolled it out on a lightly dusted surface until it looked big and thin enough. Then I rolled it around a rolling pin before draping over the cake. I had covered the entire cake with the hazelnut filling and this stuck the fondant to the cake. In hindsight, I probably should have measured the diameter of the cake as I ended up with huge amounts of pale green icing left over! After neatly cutting the fondant I decorated the cake with the pre-made flowers using edible glue, putting them randomly on the top and floating down the sides. To finish I used clear icing gel pen to fill the flowers.

One happy mum!