Panther Birthday Cake

My favorite son-in-law, Garrett, (I can say that right now since he is the only one! lol) always asks for 'easy' cakes for his birthday - usually german chocolate, etc...  and never really a cake I can decorate.  So, this year, I didn't ask him...  my daughter, Becca (his wife), and I planned to make his TWO favorite cakes - a german chocolate and a red velvet with an all butter mock whipped cream frosting and I decorated one of them with a favorite of his - a panther!  When he was in college, his society had the panther as their mascot. Although I couldn't find the same simple design he had picked for a project Becca is doing, I did find a harder one of course - although it was easier than most I had seen online.

This mock whipped cream is a harder frosting to frost and decorate with, because it is made with all butter and melts easily and also does not dry to touch (noncrusting), so it never dries to be able to get it smoother with wax paper and a fondant smoother. I had a little more problems frosting that usual, but the good thing is, his family's joke is a messy frosting means a good cake - which actually can many times be true!!  A cake that is moist and easily falls apart when frosting it, is usually the best cake!  (So don't look at the frost job!!  I was just keeping with family tradition - that's my story and I'm sticking to it!!!)

The recipe is in an early post - Red Velvet Cake with Mock Whipped Cream Frosting - Just substitute butter for shortening for a buttery flavor.

Panther Cake

The panther was put on using piping gel on wax paper to transfer the basic shape to the cake.

 Then a simple outline in orange and star-tipped in black made for a mostly easy cake. 

The whiskers gave me a bit of a hard time too, basically because I forgot to keep some white frosting and had to use canned frosting for those.  Even though there were a few 'mess-ups'... the cakes tasted great and that is what is important anyway!!  

Happy Birthday Garrett!!