Thomas the Tank Engine: Special Customised Kid's Birthday Cake in Seoul

I know, it's a long title but it makes it easier to come up on related searches in Google (hee hee).

I had the pleasure of creating a Thomas and Friends cake for a special boy who was turning 2 last weekend.  His Mom contacted me after reading my article on the Korea4expats website (Yes, that was a shameless plug) and requested for a Thomas and Friends cake.  Her son is a big fan of the show and has many engines and toys.  She sent me a sample of the kind of cake she wanted and after some discussion, we settled on a 9"/24cm 1 tier cake in Orange and Chocolate flavous lightly layered with chocolate buttercream. 

It was then frosted with Orange Buttercream made from fresh orange juice which had been reduced to a syrup.  Finally came the fondant and the decorations.  I've always liked the chocolate and orange Jaffa combination so it was nice to see the chocolate and orange layers as I put the cake together.  

Here's the completed cake before we put the toys on board

I had other cake orders for that weekend so enlisted the help of two friends who came over to my place and helped me with the decorations.  Between the 3 of us we spent 7 hours just on the fondant decorations!  That is not including the time it took bake, assemble and frost the cake (twice!).  That took about 5 hours.  I frosted the cake twice, the first time was just dry icing it as I was worried about it drying out and the second layer was for the fondant to adhere.  Based on the feedback from Chi who ordered the cake, the cake tasted good but the buttercream frosting could have been a little thinner.  Got to keep that in mind for the next one!

Fondant bow.  Train tracks were made from rolled fondant and then pepero sticks were spaced out on top.

Before we started on the fondant decorations, I drew out the scenery on a piece of paper so my friends knew what I was trying to go.  We made apple and orange trees, mountains, clouds, bushes, leaves and a cheeky little sun.

Do you like the cheeky sun peeking out from behind the mountain and bush? 

At around 2.30am we were already pretty zonked and the conversations went something like this:

Yoko: "I need some more apples."
Gerry: " Wani, just give her some more apples, Dammit!"

You had to be there for it to have been funny, I think.

Here's Yoko putting the finishing touches on the Apples and Oranges

Anyway, we were all pretty pleased with the cake and couldn't wait to see it with the trains on top of it.  In my rush to get out of the house to deliver the cake, I forgot to bring my camera but Chi who ordered the cake was nice enough to take some photos for me.  Here they are!