The Pizza Cake

A few moms asked how I made the pizza cake from Haddon's birthday so I thought I would post on my blog in case anyone else may be interested. I got my initial idea here but changed it up a bit. I added the gumdrop onions after seeing this site. If you click those links you can see that I am not at all creative - just a great thief of others' ideas!

Directions for Pizza Cake
(Adapted from Jake's Pizza Cake on grouprecipes.com)

Ingredients

• 1 16 inch pizza box - my local pizza store gave me one free
  
• 16 inch Wilton cake pan (bought with the 40% off Michael's coupon that comes in the Sunday paper). You can make this cake any size depending on your pizza box. If you use this size pan be certain to buy Wilton's heating core as well or the center of your cake will be raw - ask me how I know this ;)
• 4 Duncan Hines Cake Mixes - Classic White is my favorite. Prepare according to package directions except add 1 tsp of almond extract per cake mix to make it taste more like wedding cake - yum! You will need this many mixes if you are using the 16 inch pan which calls for 15 cups of batter. If you use a smaller pan adjust accordingly.
  
• A batch (double batch if you really like frosting) of Wilton's buttercream frosting (I make the variation that says "For pure white icing" so I can make it ahead of time and my cake won't require refrigeration due to all the butter. In addition to the butter extract and the vanilla extract I again add a few tsp of almond extract to compliment the flavor in the cake) tinted light brown using Wilton's icing colors. These can be found at any craft store and even at Wal-Mart on their cake decorating isle in the craft section. You just need a little of the brown and your color will be perfect. Regular food coloring - if you can even find brown - will make your icing too runny. Use a little extra water to thin the icing to make it easier to spread if needed.
  
• 2 cups strawberry preserves (raspberry will do too but buy seedless)
• Wilton Candy Melts 14 oz package in white, red, and light-brown (can be purchased at craft store - Michael's, Hobby Lobby and some Wal-Marts)
  
• 10 or so large malted milk balls or yogurt covered milk balls - found in bulk foods section of my grocery store
  
• Green icing (the ready made kind, in a tube makes preparation easier)
• 1/8 cup dried blueberries
• 10 or so jumbo white gumdrops - more if you use the smaller ones
• piece of cardboard cut into the same size circle as your pizza and covered with foil.
  

Directions

1. Level cake if necessary with a serrated knife and turn cake onto foil covered pizza circle.
2. Spread the tinted icing over the cake.
   
3. Over medium heat, simmer the preserves until runny. Add several drops of red food coloring (if desired) to make the color closer to that of tomato sauce.
   
4. Spread the preserves over the cake, covering the top thoroughly - be certain your preserves are not so hot they melt the frosting! Chill the cake again for at least an hour so that the preserves re-congeal.
5. Now for the fun part - decorating!
6. Sausage/Meatballs - with a very sharp knife, cut the malt balls in half, set aside
7. Green Peppers - I am sure there's lots of great ways to do this but I bought Wilton's green icing and spread it onto greased plate then placed it in the freezer. Once the icing had set I cut it into into small rectangles. Put it back in the freezer to get firm again if needed.
   
8. Pepperoni - Grease a mini-muffin tin and put one red candy-melt into each cup. Sprinkle about 1/2 teaspoon of grated brown candy-melts into each well. (I used a handheld cheese-grater to grate the candy-melts. See "cheese" below for more details). Put the muffin tin under the broiler to melt the candies (only takes a minute or two). Once they are melted, mix the red and brown candy-melts together using a toothpick. Place into the freezer for about 10 minutes or until set. Once they are hard, flip the muffin pan over to release the "pepperoni" This was a little tricky and I scorched the first 2 batches. You just need them under the broiler for a minute or so. They may not look melted but if when you swirl them with a toothpick they will be soft enough.
   
9. Olives - get the dried blueberries ready, set aside.
10. Onions- press 2 jumbo gumdrops together and press until flat - you will need to continually dip the candy in sugar to keep it from getting too sticky. I have a set of graduated circle cutters similar to this that I used to cut the onions into realistic slices in multiple sizes. If you don't have a set like this you can slice your onions like on this cake.
    
11. Cheese - I used a handheld cheese grater to grate the white candy-melts over the top of the pizza. I worked my way over the top of the pizza until it had a good coating of cheese, but not so much that the "tomato sauce" didn't peek through. Then I used the brown candy melts around the perimeter the the "crust" -- I thought it looked more crust and slightly burnt, like a real pizza would. Finally I put the entire pizza in the oven under the broiler and watched it very closely. It only took 3 minutes for the "cheese" to melt - it even browned slightly!
12. After you take it out of the oven and while it is still warm, put your toppings on the pizza. I started with the sausage/meatballs, then the green pepper, followed by the olives and the pepperoni, onions and then a little more cheese. Put it into the fridge to set again. For fun, put the pizza cake in a pizza box for a cute visual effect. Use a pizza cutter to slice cake!
    

Just one more note: You can do much of the prep for this cake ahead of time. I made the frosting and tinted it 5 days in advance. I made the onions, green pepper slices and pepperoni 2 days in advance. The day before the party I baked the cake and the morning of I put it all together.

This cake turned out to be one of my favorites and I will definitely make it again!

I don't have digital photos of many of the cakes I've made since we only got a digital camera a year ago but here are two of the others I've made. The cow was from Beckett's first birthday and R2-D2 was from Thatcher's 5th birthday.