Tie Dye Cake

Lately for birthdays, I've just been making cupcakes and putting them on simple little homemade cupcake stands.  I can match the stand to the party's decor and it's a lot easier to frost a cupcake than it is to try to decorate a cake.  However, for my daughter's Tie-Dye Birthday Party, I decided to try my hand at making an actual Tie-Dye cake, instead of just cupcakes.  I happened to find this Shirt Cake Pan in my basement when I was looking for other party supplies in my basement, and it ended up working out perfectly.  Of course a regular cake shaped pan would be just as cute.

Check out our Tie-Dyed Cake...

Pretty cute, don't you think? 

Here's what you'll need (feel free to make any of this from scratch, I just used store-bought supplies)...

* box of white cake mix + ingredients to make it
* 2 containers of white frosting
* shirt cake pan or any other shape (I happened to get mine years ago at a garage sale and it seems Wilton no longer makes them, but you could check Ebay or Amazon (affiliate link)for used ones, or just make your own shape from a regular sheet cake pan)
* food coloring

Here's what to do...

1.  Mix up your white cake mix according to package directions.  Separate the batter into 4 separate bowls, then add food coloring to each bowl to make the colors you want  ( I think I used about 15 drops of coloring in each bowl)

2.  Pour your batter into your greased cake pan.  I just did a little bit of one color here and a little bit there, until the whole pan was filled with random blobs and swirls of color.

 

3.  Bake according to package directions and allow to cool.  Then invert your cake onto the tray that you'll be using for serving.  (Don't worry if the colors look a little brownish and muted, they're nice and colorful inside the cake.)

 

4. Spread a fairly thin layer of white frosting all over your cake, then divide your remaining frosting into separate bowls and tint with food coloring.

5.  Use a toothpick to sketch a rough tie-dye swirl design in your frosting.  (My photo of the toothpick sketch was too faint, so I've drawn on the design I followed)

 

6.  Add your tinted frosting to your cake following the swirl design you sketched.  I put all my colors on first, then filled in the sections so the colors were touching.  (Notice my fancy cake decorating plastic spoon, I told you I don't decorate cakes often! ;)  )

7.  Finally, use the end of your fancy cake decorating spoon to draw the color from one swirl to the other, wiping off the spoon after each time.

 

8.  That's it!  Stick in some candles, serve your colorful cake to your birthday kid and be proud of your handiwork.

Oh, and things were way too hectic at cake serving time to get a well-photographed shot of the tie-dyed inside, but here's a quick, somewhat blurry, photo I grabbed before the girls came back inside and I had to start cutting seconds.

You can read about all the other details of our Tie-Dye Birthday Party HERE!