A Birthday tribute to my 80 year old Dad

My Dad turned 80 recently and I couldn’t be prouder.  He is one of my most favourite people in the world (along with my mum) and has the most amazing sense of humour!

He has had a few setbacks health wise and most recently has had surgery on his arm.  With this in mind, I had to include a sling when I set about recreating him in icing for the top of his cake.

For the cake itself, I made a standard Victoria Sandwich. You can find the recipe here.

I covered the whole cake in fondant icing, making sure to flatten the top and smooth over the sides.

I made the chair by shaping together 2 circles of modeling icing.  I rolled out a long strip of icing that I crimped and stuck to the outside of the chair with edible glue.  I then made the shape of the back of the chair and rolled some icing into cylinder shapes to make the arms of the chair. I then painted the whole chair with watered down food colouring to create the fabric effect

One long cylinder tube of icing created the legs to which I attached black coloured icing for feet.

I created a shape for the body and stuck it on the legs and then created the arms, adding flesh coloured hands and pressing a knife into them to create fingers.

To make the head, I rolled a circle of flesh coloured icing .  I used a cocktail stick to create holes for the eyes and then dropped in tiny balls of icing and painted on pupils.  I painted on some hair using edible silver paint and used the cocktail stick dipped in pink colouring to create the mouth.  At this stage , I stuck on a little blob of flesh coloured icing to make the nose.

My finishing touches were to make a walking stick and a coffee table topped with a tiny remote control and glasses.

Although the end result looks a bit rough and ready, I have to say that my Dad was delighted with it and that is quite good enough for me!