So from traditional to down right freaky. This month I was asked to make a cake fit for zombies...a brain cake of course!
This cake is to support the Cambridge Zombiegeddon, a flash mob zombie walk for Halloween. I've taken all of this technical description from their page so I get it right :)
"A flash mob (or flashmob) is a group of people who assemble suddenly in a public place, perform an unusual and sometimes seemingly pointless act for a brief time, and then disperse, often for the purposes of entertainment and/or satire. Flash mobs are organized via telecommunications, social media, or viral emails The term, coined in 2003, is generally not applied to events and performances organized for the purposes of politics (such as protests), commercial advertisement, publicity stunts that involve public relation firms, or paid professionals
our aim is to do this at Halloween in Cambridge (Saturday the 29th) with anyone who would like to get involved it would sure as hell be fun!!! And that's the aim it's got to be fun and safe.
There will be 3 stages to this event with exact information becoming available shortly before the actual march so make sure you keep your eyes peeled.
There are a lot of different flash mobs zombie walks etc available on youtube I suggest you have a look to see what we are trying to aim for.
I have change the event to the Saturday for a few reasons mainly there are always more people in Cambridge and I am sure we will have lots of hungry zombies!! And we want a lot of people to witness the zombie march ... not only that, Saturday is a better day for most people.
So dress as a zombie and hunt for some brains tell your friends (BUT KEEP IT A SECRATE) you can be as original as you like or stick to the classic brain dead zombies. The wilder and more unusual the better.
We are currently looking to fill a few main roles in the organisation of the hoard.
We need a production team available to record the event although we encourage you to take a camera yourself and document the day, write a blog share on facebook or twitter.
If you think you can help in any areas at all please let us know it would be great to get your ideas and thoughts?
You can follow us on twitter @zombiegeddon_uk or #zombiegeddon share our events page on facebook or even use the flyer above.
Above all have fun
TM :D "
Right, now all of you cake lovers, let's talk about that big old brain! There was only really going to be one choice for the actual cake itself, Victoria Sponge simply wasn't going to do. So the logical choice was of course for Red Velvet cake! There's nothing better than when tucking into a brain than to see a gorgeous piece of Red Velvet under there. Although this cake wasn't really suited to cream cheese frosting so I opted for scary looking jam instead.
I baked the cake in a Pyrex bowl, perfect brain shape that my lovely mum bought for me because I couldn't find anything else that would fit. It took over an hour to bake because it was so fat and I wanted to do it in one big go rather than having to get pieces to match up. I did have to carve down some sides to give it a bit of shape but other than that is was perfect.
I covered the cake in pink fondant coloured in Claret Sugarflair colouring paste. I tried to leave it a little marbled so it didn't look too perfect. I googled for good brain pictures for ages so I could get the right look. I decided I would make long sausages in the pink fondant, as long as I could and layer them on the cake in the squiggle pattern, pressing them against eachother to look like they were part of the same thing.
I wanted to get some shadowing to really bring out that good ole organ look - why not! Using Christmas Red (not very apt!) I used a brush to dab it in the creases Art Attack style, I watered it down a bit so it was more like paint. I dabbed it over some more to make it look a bit bloodied. I really wanted it to look like it had just been harvested from some poor unexpecting soul, and dumped in a box. So I created my own jam glaze. I didn't want to use an already red jam as I wanted it to be a bit lighter, so I used some jam I had left over from the Sachertorte, apricot. I then coloured it up with the same red and added water to make it a bit more glaze like so it spread more easily and looked a bit more like goo. Yum. I slathered this all over the brain enough to make any zombie drool...or moan?
To finish off the look I put the cake on some baking paper while I messily (on purpose) splattered some more blood jam on the brain so it splattered the paper. I wanted it to look almost like it came from a zombie butchers. There's no room for pretty cake boxes during zombieggon so I had a brain wave. I'd get a normal old boring cardboard box like you'd find in a bin and splat some bloody handprints on the side like passing zombies were trying to get to the brain. I did this with more Christmas Red and latex gloves...the food colouring is really hard to get off your hands so I decided to play it safe. I also did a bit of advertising with #zombiegeddon written on the sides just so you all know what the cake is supporting.
I then tied it all up with a lovely length of packaging string...pretty huh? And the look was complete. I'm actually really impressed with how it looked, fresh from a horror film and how easy it was to put together. I found it really fun to make as you do need something different upon all over the glitter and hearts now and then and what's better than making a cake that looks like a brain, ready to be feasted upon?
Happy brain eating.
Zom! x (did you see what I did there....) :D
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