Skylanders Portal of Power Birthday Cake and Cake Pops

My little boy turned 8 yesterday. EIGHT!?! How is that even possible? I'm only twelve myself... (well... that's how I am perceived sometimes...). His current fad is Skylanders Giants, so his request for his birthday cake was, of course, a Skylanders cake. If you don't have a young son who loves playing on his console, you may not know what this means. But if you do, then you will understand. 

My usual strategy of googling images inspired me to create a Portal of Power as the main cake, and my recent cake pop masterclass meant I could try out my new skills to make the heads of the characters into cake pops, rather than modelling complicated figures out of fondant. 

We also had guest at the party who is coeliac, so the cake needed to be gluten-free, so Rachel Allen's 'grown-up' chocolate mousse cake recipe was ideal. 

Ta daaaah!

Happy 8th Birthday, Skylanders Fan!

First I crumb coated the mousse cake in chocolate buttercream icing. Then I rolled out some white fondant, and laid it on the top. Next I began to layer up some grey fondant icing, rolled out and cut in brick/rock shapes, placed in 8 even (ish) shapes.

Rocks

Then build up the pillars.

More layers

Finished pillars. 

 You can get a great 'rock' effect by simply rolling up some greaseproof paper in a ball and gently pressing it into the icing. Genius. (I read this on another blog, so if it's yours, let me know and I will credit you.) (And thank you!)

Spot the difference!

Use the greaseproof paper trick to make the spiral shape on the top too.

I used another chocolate mousse cake mixed with a bit of buttercream to make cake pops. Make sure you let it stand for a while before  making the cake balls, as it's far too squidgy initally, but after a few hours sitting in the bowl, it will become nice and kneadable.

Fizz Pop v Fizz Pop

Lots of Fizz Pops

Eruptor!