Mar 27 2012

Harley Davidson Birthday Cake

categorized as birthday, novelty

A friend of mine (hi, Alyssa!) asked me to make her mother a birthday cake. Her mom was turning fortysomething and LOVES Harley Davidson motorcycles. Awesome! I love a good challenge, but I also knew that attempting to create that logo out of fondant could shave a year or two off my life. I was right. It was the most challenging design I’ve done – but I’m so happy with how it turned out!

It’s also fitting that I was asked to make this cake just weeks before I move to Milwaukee (the home of Harley Davidson). Ride on!

I made a three-layer 10″ cake. The bottom and top layers were white cake dyed orange and the center layer was chocolate. I tried to make a black layer, but it looks more gray than anything else. Sadface.

I frosted the cake with buttercream icing.

I created the Harley logo out of black and orange fondant. I used Fondarific fondant, which I ordered from Amazon.com. I highly recommend it!

I printed out a large high-quality version of the logo and used that as my template. I traced the general shape of the logo, but cut the letters out by hand (tracing just didn’t do the job well enough). Invest in a set of Exacto knives if you’re going to be doing a lot lettering – it makes it easier!

I surrounded the cake with little balls of black and orange fondant to give it a more finished appearance.

Let me know if you have any questions!

categorized as birthday, novelty

11 comments

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Laura - March 27, 2012 - 7:22 am

How do you get the buttercream so smooth??

Amazing cake!

Annie - March 27, 2012 - 10:15 am

Thanks, Laura! I frost the cake and allow the frosting to “set”, meaning that if you touch it, your hand will come away frosting-free. Then I use a Viva paper towel (smooth, with no patterns or designs) to smooth the cake. Here’s a video explaining the technique: http://www.monkeysee.com/play/988-cake-decorating-a-secret-to-smoothing-icing

Mary-Michael McDonald - March 27, 2012 - 10:27 am

So cool! My husband would love this. Thanks for the tips!

Mary-Michael McDonald - March 27, 2012 - 10:33 am

OK, I just watched that video and that is about the handiest tip ever for this perfectionist! I spent an hour on my last cake trying to get it smooth just using my off set spatula. I about lost my mind. Thank you, thank you!!

Annie - March 27, 2012 - 10:44 am

I know what you mean — getting the icing to be smooth can be maddening! Hope the tip helps :)

Laura R. - March 27, 2012 - 11:19 am

Great job on this! Looks awesome.

Annie - March 27, 2012 - 11:29 am

Thank you! :)

Hannah - March 27, 2012 - 10:43 pm

That looks really good! I’ve never worked with fondant, but i’ve always wanted to… :)

Alice - April 1, 2012 - 1:26 pm

My dad’s gonna love it!
I love your cakes, even though it’s sometimes challenging cause i live in France and most of the time i can’t find the ingredients you talk about…

Annie - April 1, 2012 - 10:51 pm

Thanks for the comment, Alice! Feel free to e-mail me if you ever have questions about supplies or what I’m talking about :)

Alice - April 7, 2012 - 3:56 am

I will, thanks for offering ! :)