This quick and easy Rudolph cake tutorial will take you out of a bind if you’re short on time this holiday season.
And the best part is, it can be used to decorate a cake covered in fondant, buttercream, chocolate ganache or modelling chocolate – the choice is yours!
Rudolph Cake Tutorial: Materials
- an 8″ inch cake covered in either brown fondant or buttercream or milk chocolate ganache or modelling chocolate
- 8 1/2 oz/240g brown fondant or modelling chocolate
- 2 oz/60g of white fondant
- 1/3 oz/10g or less of red fondant
- rolling pin
- a small, sharp knife or sugarcraft cutting wheel (plus round cutters if you have them: 2 inch, 1 inch and 1/2 inch)
- water/edible glue or melted chocolate for sticking piece in place
- holly cutter (optional)
Rudolph Cake Tutorial: How-To
- Start by taking 200g of brown fondant or modelling chocolate and rolling it into a smooth ball. Then press it into your work surface to flatten the bottom, while keeping the nice rounded shape on the top side.
- Position the half-sphere of brown fondant on the bottom half of the cake as shown below and when you are happy with the position, secure it to the cake by brushing water/edible glue/melted chocolate on to the chosen spot to attach it.
- Cut out a red circle of fondant approximately 2 inches/5cm and glue it into place over the half sphere of brown fondant as shown.
- Next cut out a tiny crescent of white fondant and place it on to Rudolph’s red nose to give the illusion of shine.
- Take 1 1/2 oz or 40g of brown fondant/modelling chocolate and mix it with the same quantity of white fondant or white modelling chocolate to make a lighter brown color. Roll it out on your work surface.
- Using a sharp knife or cutting wheel, cut out an extended leaf shape freehand about 3 1/2 inches/9cm in length. Using the first cut-out as a template, cut out three more leaf shapes that will represent Rudolph’s antlers.
- Glue the “antlers” into place on the cake one overlapping the other as shown below.
- Roll out some white fondant and cut out 1 inch/2 1/2 cm white circle for the eyes. Roll the circles out a little more to extend them slightly to create an slightly more oval shape.
- Cut out two small black circles, 1/2 inch/0.6cm, for the pupils. Glue the whites of the eyes and pupils together.
- You can finish Rudolph at this stage or you can add a festive spray of holly over his eyes. You can use a holly cutter for the leaves or cut out a freehand shape with a sharp knife if you prefer. Make two leaves from green fondant plus three red berries for the center. If you prefer to make a wired spray (which you can keep for more Christmases to come) learn how to create a wired gumpaste holly spray in our gumpaste holly tutorial here.
