3D 3
Laundry Monkie
by burton wills · submitted Aug 3, 2009 · 2009 contest
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Description
I started with Wenceslao Almazan’s Laundry Monkie design… and a dream. (I just put in the dream part to make it sound cooler.)
Constructing this cake was as much an engineering exercise as a culinary or artistic one. I wanted to create a cake that reflected both aspects of the t-shirt; the out-in-the-light aspect as well as the glow-in-the-dark aspect.
The cake was made from a recipe that my mom gave me when she heard I was decorating cakes. It was my grandmother’s recipe (meaning my grandmother cut it out of a magazine way back when). It has some name like Sinful Devil’s Food Cake. I baked it in a large sheet cake pan (the largest that will fit in my oven) and then cut, frosted, leveled, and stacked it into a terrifying seven layer tower.
While tasting some of the cake scraps some friends, who imagine themselves possessed of a comedic wit, began a debate as to whether the cake was actually sinful or merely criminal.
After layering the cake I set about replacing some of my friends.
The cake, which would serve as the washing machine in the shirt design, was covered in white fondant. The various laundry paraphernalia were made from gum paste and colored fondant. In order to reduce the weight of the monkey, (or Monkie) he was made from loosely packed rice cereal treat and covered with gum paste.
Because I was hoping to achieve the back lighted window effect of the glow-in-the-dark aspect of the shirt design, I wanted the laundry basket to be hollow rather than fondant draped over cake. I formed the laundry basket from gum paste and set it aside to set up so it would be good and hard. However, that meant I had to balance the monkey independent of the laundry basket or wait until it had set to position the monkey. Instead of waiting I balanced the monkey on 2 skewers, one through the cake and the other in the handle of the broom.
I thought the laundry should include 2 or 3 Threadless Tees. And going for extreme realism I made sure that none of the socks matched. The paper airplanes were made from gum paste and attached “in flight” with paper covered wire (the kind used for sugar flowers stems) whose ends were rapped in florist tape and stuck into the cake.
I took the normal photos first and then got my light table to use as a back light and took some “glow-in-the-dark” silhouette photos.
Upon cutting the first serving the terrifying 7 layer tower began to buckle under the weight of the monkey and the fondant. Several serving later and the would-be King Kong was toppled and almost immediately devoured by children.
In the end, ‘twas gluttony killed the beast.
Constructing this cake was as much an engineering exercise as a culinary or artistic one. I wanted to create a cake that reflected both aspects of the t-shirt; the out-in-the-light aspect as well as the glow-in-the-dark aspect.
The cake was made from a recipe that my mom gave me when she heard I was decorating cakes. It was my grandmother’s recipe (meaning my grandmother cut it out of a magazine way back when). It has some name like Sinful Devil’s Food Cake. I baked it in a large sheet cake pan (the largest that will fit in my oven) and then cut, frosted, leveled, and stacked it into a terrifying seven layer tower.
While tasting some of the cake scraps some friends, who imagine themselves possessed of a comedic wit, began a debate as to whether the cake was actually sinful or merely criminal.
After layering the cake I set about replacing some of my friends.
The cake, which would serve as the washing machine in the shirt design, was covered in white fondant. The various laundry paraphernalia were made from gum paste and colored fondant. In order to reduce the weight of the monkey, (or Monkie) he was made from loosely packed rice cereal treat and covered with gum paste.
Because I was hoping to achieve the back lighted window effect of the glow-in-the-dark aspect of the shirt design, I wanted the laundry basket to be hollow rather than fondant draped over cake. I formed the laundry basket from gum paste and set it aside to set up so it would be good and hard. However, that meant I had to balance the monkey independent of the laundry basket or wait until it had set to position the monkey. Instead of waiting I balanced the monkey on 2 skewers, one through the cake and the other in the handle of the broom.
I thought the laundry should include 2 or 3 Threadless Tees. And going for extreme realism I made sure that none of the socks matched. The paper airplanes were made from gum paste and attached “in flight” with paper covered wire (the kind used for sugar flowers stems) whose ends were rapped in florist tape and stuck into the cake.
I took the normal photos first and then got my light table to use as a back light and took some “glow-in-the-dark” silhouette photos.
Upon cutting the first serving the terrifying 7 layer tower began to buckle under the weight of the monkey and the fondant. Several serving later and the would-be King Kong was toppled and almost immediately devoured by children.
In the end, ‘twas gluttony killed the beast.
