Smackdown: Marzipan v. Fondant

Yes, I would like the oil pipeline, maybe Druzhba - with a few spills on the way, maybe an occasional fire. Wouldn't that be lovely?

I have an excellent compromise... a tar pit, with a black oily dinosaur head emerging.

(Tarpit, oilspill, coprolite, or cute li'l black bunny, I cannot WAIT to see this cake!!!)

OH MAN! AN ENVIRONMENTAL DISASTER BIRTHDAY CAKE!

I COULD DECORATE ONE OF HIS BATHTUB BOATS AS THE EXXON VALDEZ.

HOLY ****. WHERE WERE YOU WHEN I NEEDED YOU MOST?

I actually love the tar pit cake idea.

And dino poop. Mo would so dig that.

You all crack me up.

And here I thought I'd come up with something brilliant with "garden hose".

Today I was shopping for goody bag stuff and saw a lot of Easter things. So now I'm thinking chocolate bunnies for the garden if I can find some little 3-D bunnies.....

I have shown off my marzipan vegetables to a few people to rave reviews so fingers crossed my cake will be cool.

After dagmarka said she thought the flower/straw idea was cool I bought a few more bendy straws today. I'll whip up some sugar cookie flowers this week!

I'm sooo gonna use that one day. We used to organize Feasts with an ex-roommate of mine and littlek's. We had a duck feast, we had a pasta feast, and a few others. I think it will be time to hold one when I come back and the Environmental Disaster Cake will most likely be the culinary highlight. You can have cute creatures there, too, and environmentalists savind the oil-dipped ducks and seals...

But i do love the straw flowers idea (how do you make those flowers? i didn't quite get it. What's a sugar cookie, and can you form them like marzipan?) It would also be dandy to have candied real flowers on those straws....but that sounds like much work.

Is there going to be a dinosaur in the happy garden? Make sure it's no T-rex or any other carnivorous creature. Just a happy vegetarian one.

I would do some ganache for an oil spill cake -- that would be perfect!

Or for a tar pit cake....

Now I really want to do a tar pit cake.

One of those flourless fudge cakes with the dinos shoved in right after baking.

Kind of like a Mardi Gras cake but with dinosaurs.

A sugar cookie is a very plain cookie that can be rolled out an cut into any shape. Then it can be topped with sugar or icing.

I'm not sure if I will go with dinosaurs on this particular cake but maybe a replica of our cat with a dead bird in her mouth....

Eeeeyeaaa! I'm so excited for Mo. I still remember the cakes I had as a kid - the truly beautiful and creative ones. Lots of bakers/cooks in my family; it's a wonder I am not fatter than fat!

Boom, did you have to colour the store bought marz. before shaping yourself? I mean, shaping the marzipan?! I'm thinking of getting some, just for fun, to eat and share with all these silly people around me who haven't tasted nor heard of it.

I LOVE the ideas y'all are coming up with.

Yes, I did color it with food coloring. It is kind of tan on it's own.

Then I went back and painted it with food coloring because nothing is really just one color and I was unhappy with the flat color.

It was the painting that really made it cool.

For instance -- I worked green food coloring in to make the watermelons. It turned out a nice light green. Then I went back with a tiny brush and straight color and painted stripes on the watermelons.

boomer, can i have a wish? can you have one little snail in the garden and tell Mo he crawled there all the way from Slovakia? Thanks, that would please me tremendously.

Oh, I see. That sounds do-able and cheap enough to try. Thx.

That would be so cool to have that lil dag snail.

Portland, Oregon is known by many names:

The City of Roses
Bridge Town

Also

Stump Town

and

Slug Town

Oregon slugs are sent all over undercover as "escargot".

There is no such thing as an Oregon garden without a healthy dose of slugs (and giant (and I do mean giant as a species) earthworms).

I'll slap a shell on one beautiful marzipan slug and name it Dagmar!

Hmmm how to get snailish brown....

Perhaps a bit of cold coffee to color it with?

Our snails are kind of marzipan and coffee colored.

Are Slovakian snails similar?

For some reason photobucket keeps rejecting most of my photos today but I managed to get one of the preliminary cake loaded. It might actually be finished instead of preliminary... I don't know yet.

What do you think?

(Dag- that is your snail front and center (I don't make very good snails).)

Magnificent!

From my point of view the snail could be an asp with protective instincts.

Magnificent is just the word.

Wow!!!!!

Geez, Louise, I'm starving for cake now.

Absolutely fabulous boomer!!

That' looks so inviting, I'm with osso - a piece of this one
would be just bliss right now.

Thanks!

Heehee. I think it's turning out pretty cute. I'm letting it chill up a bit before I do the final stuff but I think it will be really fun. I hope all the flavors I used work together: carrot cake (from soz's recipe), filled with apple butter and caramel, with chocolate and marzipan and craisin decorations and a chocolate graham cracker fence.

I wish the other photos would load as they show it off a bit better.

Mmmmm.......drooool.

Now that is what I call art. Beautiful, boom!