The Monkey Cake.

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My boyfriend has two friends (a married couple) who have a super cute little boy who just turned one. They commissioned me to do a monkey cake, as the party was Curious George themed. The cake didn't necessarily have to be Curious George, but it did have to be a monkey. It also had to be big. Big enough for a guest list of 30-40 people. YOW! That's one popular baby!

Knowing that I love to bake, they hired me to do the cake. They were going to do it themselves, but figured it'd be best to hand it over to someone else. This is the first full cake I've ever done. Sure, I've made like a 9" x 13" sheet cake before, but those were lame, especially compared to this.

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The rectangular part of the body was made from a 12" x 18" pan, and the head was a 9" round. The ears were from a 4" ramekin, cut in half and trimmed down. And that thing that looks like a belly button? That's from the heating core. Wilton makes these heating core things that look like the middle of a bundt pan. You stick it in large cake so they bake more evenly. They're hallow, so you fill it w/ batter and when everything's done baking, you take the cake out of the core and plug it back into the whole cake! BRILLIANT! Thus the belly button in Mr. Monkey here.

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The cake is vanilla. All the colored frosting is vanilla malt. The darker brown parts of the monkey are chocolate frosting. This was also the first time I ever made chocolate frosting. Out of all the crazy, nutty things I bake, I have never once made homemade chocolate frosting. Funny, huh? Everyone always orders the salted caramel, vanilla malt, or raspberry amaretto frosting. But since this was both adults and kids, it had to be pretty tame.

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Here he is! In all his vanilla monkey glory. Not bad for a first time big fat cake, right? He probably would look better in fondant, but let's face it. Fondant's gross. I don't know anyone who likes to eat fondant. Do you? I doubt it. Even Duff from Ace of Cakes admits its gross--that's why they cover the cakes w/ buttercream before putting the fondant on. That way you can just take the fondant off and eat what's underneath. So gooey frosting it is!

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The piping wasn't perfect, but for someone who's never taken a class or been trained in anything... not too shabby, I'd say.