Flowerpot Cake

“Hey Mum, I’m sorry I didn’t have time to bake a cake for Babcia’s birthday!  I bought her some flowers instead.  …I think there’s something wrong with the pot though.”

Mum goes over and looks at the flowers.

“You’re right, it does look a little funny.”  She touches the “pot”.  “Oh!  It’s cake!  The flowerpot is cake!”

• • • • • •

We did the same thing to my Grandma, when she came over to celebrate with us.

For my dearest grandma’s (Babcia, in Polish) 80th birthday I decided to do something a bit out of the ordinary…

A flowerpot cake!  Very amusing to see everyone be confused by it for a split second before they realised it was edible!  And it all is, except of course the flowers, which, out of necessity, are fake ones, as they’re easier to insert/remove.

It takes a bit of time, and a hell of a lot of icing, but the results speak for themselves.

This was quite a big cake.  It was four layers, with vanilla and strawberry flavouring.  Put aside some time to bake the cakes, or even do it the night before. The cakes will keep very well if you double wrap them in cling wrap when they’re not *completely* cooled – it helps keep some of the moisture in the cake, making it less likely to become dry (bleh! dry cake!).

So very pink, it was strawberry flavoured though

Once the cakes are baked/cooled, you can begin assembling them.  Just plop them one on top of another, and trim the edges to make it straight.

Layered and iced

You need to ice the layers also, and all around the cake.  Just a thin layer, mind you, because it’s unnecessary to pile it on since the “basketweave” design is going over the sides of the cake.

What?  What is this basketweave design you speak of Crissy?  Well, it sounds/looks complicated, but that couldn’t be further from the truth.  Here’s a corny video explaining how to do basketweave.

You will also need the right icing tip.

Wilton #47, basketweave.

This tip makes it so simple.  And they’re easy to find at any home wares specialty store (Eg. House, Let’s Cook, etc.)

So, apply the design to the cake.  This was my first attempt at this, so it’s not perfect, and I was on a bit of a deadline.  I’m sure if you put more care into the icing it wouldn’t be quite so haphazard in areas.

For the top, I made some green buttercream icing and grated some milk chocolate, to resemble dirt and grass.  The grass was made by using a snap-lock bag with holes poked through a corner, using a skewer.  Comes out like thin spaghetti.  Since then, I’ve bought a nifty little icing attachment which looks a lot more authentic.

Wilton #233, grass

If you can, do get the icing tip – as you can see it looks a lot more authentic!

Back to the cake at hand!

At this stage, all you need to do is add some flowers.  This involved a quick trip to the local Spotlight for me.   The usual – make sure the flowers are squeaky clean and watch out since you’re mixing plastic flowers and flames – can have melty results.

Add some candles and voila!  Birthday cake!

Happy birthday!

The colour contrasts are fun!

You could also make this into a basket, rather than a pot-plant.

It was a blast to make, and went down well (visually and taste-wise).  I’m so glad I could surprise my grandma, who is such an amazing cook, baker, and, well, person.  That was the best part.