One of the best parts of my job is being asked to make cakes that are a little unusual. So when I got a request for a vegan badger cake, I was super excited.
The problem when trying to ice a cake in fondant that's vegan is one most people don't know how to overcome: it's finding a crumb coat that will hold fast when you apply icing on top. Many vegan frostings are just too soft, which means the fondant on top will ripple, showing the cake lines underneath. As the Go Jetters would say, "not cool".
So the first thing you need to do when you crumb coat a vegan cake is to use ganache. It's the only way I know to get fondant with sharp edges. The ganache obviously can't have cream in it, so I use coconut milk instead, which has a plus point in 2 ways: firstly, it's dairy-free and means people with a milk allergy can enjoy the cake. Secondly, coconut milk has a much longer shelf-life than cream, which means you can keep it in the cupboard for some time.
For this cake, I needed a grey fondant, so I used Sugarflair black colouring to make a white fondant dark grey. The great thing about these colours is you hardly need any to make the colour you want and they last for years, so they're really worth investing in.
Then I needed my badger features. These were fairly straightforward, if a little time-consuming. I took three strips of white fondant and cut notches out of the sides with a knife. I then applied them to the cake using a tiny amount of water (the amount you'd need to make a stamp sticky).
Afterwards, I added two little balls of pink fondant for the cheeks, two balls of black fondant for the eyes and then a nose by using a cocktail stick to make nostrils. The final touch was to add two little hands for the badger on the side of the cake, which you can just see in the picture below.
As usual, the whole cake was gluten-free (as well as vegan). Hurrah!
Have you ever made a novelty cake you're really proud of? Do share your work below!