Vegan MOFO Day 12: Birthday Cake Galore w/ Homemade Fondant/Gumpaste

Every year for Chey's, my little sister, birthday I make her a vegan chocolate cake and this year was no different. I used the recipe from The joy of vegan baking but I add some instant espresso to bring out some more of the chocolate flavor in the cake.  The Recipe is listed on her sample recipe page " Chocolate Cake"

This year I also took on fondant. I have been wanting to work with fondant for a while and hadn't been able to find any vegan recipes but luckily I came across a "Rolled Butter cream" recipe on allrecipes.com which was vegan! I was so excited!!!

So on to making the cakes. I started by mixing 3 cakes and ended up using 6 of the Chocolate cake recipes. Two for the small cake and four for the large. I was in such a hurry for the first 3 cakes I ended up only using half the cocoa in the recipe for the first large cake. I was worried it would taste funny but I actually think it tasted more like the mellow taste of a red velvet cake. So for people who like chocolate but not tons try using half the recipe it still works and tastes really good.

Forgot to use Cocoa to powder my pans... so they were both covered in flour.
 Didn't ruin the taste but they didn't look very pretty until I put icing on them. Next cakes I used cocoa.

 Next while I waited on the first cakes to cool I mixed up the fondant. This was a messy task. Powder sugar went everywhere. Each fondant recipe called for 2 pds of powder sugar to be mixed in. That is alot and it seems like it will never happen but it really does take in most of the powder sugar.

The beginning of the fondant.

Totally mixed getting ready for the fridge.

Started to add coloring. Made 4 or 5 colors all turned out pretty.

After the cakes cooled and I took them from there pans I cut the tops off, so they would lay flat, and not crack. Then I noticed they were to small and so I made 3 more cakes... This time I remembered all the chocolate... :)

So after the cakes finally cooled I crumb icinged them with a little more icing then a crumb layer because my sister loves chocolate. Then started working with the fondant. Problem was every time I rolled it out it all fell apart. It took some doing but I kneaded in some more powder sugar and then stuck it in the fridge to get cold. It was much easier to work with then. The 2nd batch I got to much sugar in and that caused it to crack when I put it on the cake. So it is a very small balance at which you need to fall between to get the fondant to not crack or sloth off. But I had fun working with it and it is something I will definitely do again.

First color took some work. But it went on pretty smooth.
The purple one cracked a little though and was more bumpy.

I also made cupcakes for her whole class and I took them to school the following day which was actually her B-day. She turned 9. So

Made 24 of these and they were yummy too.

 Happy B-Day Baby Girl!!!!!!!