Working with Marzipan

 

Here's a cake I made this past weekend for a friend of mine.  Her son is allergic to gluten so this is actually gluten free cake. I think I've refined my recipe for a vanilla gluten free cake--the taste and texture is starting to get really close to a "normal" vanilla cake.  Because of the gluten allergy, I have to be really careful of what to put in for decorations. Last time I made a gluten free cake, I used fondant.  But this time I didn't really want to make one so I decided to use marzipan.  Luckily the birthday boy is not allergic to almonds! I thought it would save me some time if I just bought the ready made marzipan from the grocery store.  Wrong! I bought one then when I got home I read the ingredients then it said it contained wheat! Well, there goes that idea!  So I ended up whipping up marzipan from scratch! It was easier than I thought it would be.  Scroll down below to see more cake pictures.

 

This is my first time working with marzipan.  Not quite sure yet if I actually like working with it or not. 

 

 

The theme of the party was Noah's Ark.  I actually made a pair of each animal.  But when I started putting them on the cake, they won't fit! So, I decided to just ditch their partners :)  Still looked ok, I thought. But it still kinda bothers me that I couldn't put the pair!

 

 

I was going to leave the cake like this.  Somehow, I liked the simplicity of this.  I sent a picture of the cake to my friend to see if she approves.  She asked if maybe I could add a little more to the sides, like maybe some stripes.

 

 

I like this picture! It almost looks like the giraffe and the lion are having a conversation! "Hey Lion, what ya doin'?" "Oh hey Giraffe, just chillin'." Hahaha!

Stripes or no stripes?  I think they both grew on me :)