This Noah’s Ark Cake Design is one of my favorite tutorials! The animals were so much fun to create, and I love the surprise rainbow layers on the inside as a great way to tie in the rainbow at the end of the Noah’s Ark story.
In Part One of our Video, we demonstrate creating the adorable animals for the cake. In Part Two, we demonstrate creating the rainbow cake,
Materials for Part One:
Gum Paste. I used Satin Ice brand gum paste, but any brand or recipe is fine. (Or, you can use fondant with enough tylose kneaded in to make it ideal for modeling).
Black Satin Ice fondant-**Optional. I used for the panda arms and ears, but for such a small amount, kneading black gel into white fondant would work fine.
Coloring Gel (I used Americolor) – Deep Pink (flamingos), Golden Yellow (Lions), Chocolate Brown, Leaf Green (alligators), Super Black (grey for the elephants, black ears for panda), & Lemon Yellow (Giraffes),
Tools for modeling: A scriber needle or toothpick, a sharp knife for creating the open mouths
Lollipop sticks – I used for creating some of the nostrils, and for anchoring the flamingos and giraffes (wooden skewers would work also) –
Americolor Black Pen- for marking on the panda, and creating eyes on the animals, and various accents.
Pastry Wheel-*Optional, I used this for texture on the alligator
Buttercream or royal and a small round piping tip (I used a 4 but 1, 2, or 3 would have been fine). This is for our alligator teeth.
Floral wire: optional– for giraffe horns. Gum paste would have worked too. I used an 18 or 20 gauge so that it would be firm enough to hold up the little balls on the end. I also used it for my olive branch.
Materials for Part Two:
Double Batch white almond sour cream cake (doctored mix) . Use your cake recipe of choice that can withstand a small amount of carving. (We used this to make two 6 inch cake layers for the ark, and 6 thin 8 inch layers.)
Fluffy Vanilla Buttercream -Enough to fill and frost a fairly tall 8 inch cake, and to crumb coat the ark.
Chocolate and White Fondant– I used Chocolate Satin Ice kneaded into white Satin Ice to achieve the shade of brown that I wanted for my ark. You do not have to use chocolate fondant at all, but it did make things move a little more quickly.
Scriber Needle, Sharp Knife, Toothpick–Any of these would be helpful in creating the look of the wooden boards that made up the ark.
Rice Cereal Treats–We used 3.5 (pre-packaged) to create the “house” on top of the ark.
Coloring Gels used: We tinted 6 bowls, each filled with 1 ¼cups white cake batter. Colors used (All are Americolor Brand): Americolor Red Red, Americolor Orange, Lemon Yellow, Electric Green, Sky Blue, Regal Purple.
Bubble Tea Straws- I placed four beneath the ark (which was on it’s own cardboard cake circle)
Cardboard Cake Circles- I used two…one beneath the 8″ cake and one beneath the 6″ ark.
***In the video, I note that I first tried making the base of the ark with a Wilton half ball pan. We had completed the ark and placed the animals when we looked over after a few hours and the ark has SPLIT in half and was ruined. (ARRRGGGH!) –
As I explained in the video, I think that there were two main contributing factors. The first is that my giraffes and flamingos had long anchors which would have been fine if not for the fact that the cake was tapered and the animals on the outer edge were a little weighty. Perhaps using the “durable” recipe would have made things better, but I didn’t want to take any chances with my second try.
With my second try, I did not taper my cake and I used 6″ layers. The final result to me is every bit as cute as the first try, but without the risk!
Melissa, what is the best way to store your edible markers?
Hi–We always store our Americolor pens in our decorating drawer at room temp. I was just googling to check myself and see that refrigerating supposedly extends the life…but ours seem to last a long time without refrigerating.
Thank you so much for this video… I love this cake and I really needed explanation on how to make the animals, and sure enough you have come to the rescue once again… I love your work and this site. Thank you again.. :)
Great video, love the animals.. specially the flamingo with leaves.. lol I love to hear Bebe voice from backstage, thanks for the video the cake is beautifull :)
I LOVE your tutorial…. great work.. you have great tutorials…
Any chance in future tutorials you could show us the bodies of the giraffe and panda? I just love watching how they are done…
Just loving your site!
Keep up the great work…
I want to make this cake for my son’s baptism. How far in advance can you make the animals for the cake?
Thanks.
Love to see a full bodied alligator too… :)
As always! Congratulations, you are a true “inspiration”! Thank you from Barcelona, Spain.
Hi-I just love this cake school. Melissa iam unable to watch any of the videos.it just doesn’t play. Iam using the ipad.
Hi Zeeba, thanks for letting us know, yesterday our video hosting site, Viddler, made an update creating a problem with some of our videos. I thought it had been corrected. I can see the Noah’s Ark video on my laptop but, like you, I cannot see it on my ipad . We will be working today to resolve the problem. I’ll keep in touch.
Hi, Zeeba, I was able to see the video when I refreshed the page. Give that a try and let me know if your problem is solved.
Hi,bebe,thanks so much for looking into my problem. Yes, I can watch the videos when I tried today.just love to spend my afternoons on this school.its really amazing.thanks again.
I had a go at this style of cake using the tutorial. Thank you so much I had a lot of fun working on the cake and it came out really well.
I made this cake for my friend’s little girl’s dedication. I made the roof in pink with a bit of sparkle. She loved it. The animals are so cute. Thankyou for your wonderful videos
Kathryn, I LOVE it! You did a fantastic job! xo