Koi Fish Birthday Cake

Recipe for Rice Krispies

Ingredients

145g marshmallow
3 cups of rice bubbles

Instructions
Melt marshmallows, then add rice bubbles mix, turn out on greased bench and let rest for a few minutes.
Then bring together and shape and sculpt to shape you want. Refrigerate and once cooled and firm carve if needed.
I found this recipe from one of the lovely cake pages I used to follow but unfortunately I cannot remember who's page, I would love to credit them for their recipe.

The Story behind this Cake

My Koi fish cake which I made for my brother's 26th birthday, is meant to represent things I wish for him. A koi fish symbolizes good fortune, success, prosperity, longevity, courage, ambition and perseverance.

I always like to do birthday cakes for my family members, so when my brother's birthday was approaching, I knew I wanted to make him a cake that has something to do with fish or fishing as he loves to fish and also has gold fish at home. I searched google for fishing cakes and photos of fish for some inspiration. I found hundreds and hundreds of different versions of fishing theme cakes, yet I was still uninspired. I knew I wanted to do something different, something that would challenge me and also hopefully amaze and inspire others. So I searched some more fish photos still not knowing what I was looking for and then there it was. Photo of a Koi fish leaping out of water! I liked it as soon as I saw it. I saved the image and then started thinking about how I was going to make that fish look like it's leaping or swimming.

Koi Fish Image - Inspiration for Cake

How I Create the Fish?

I didn't want to make the fish out of cake, so I decided to make it out of Rice Krispies which I made myself. I sculpted and carved the fish's body until I was happy with the shape, then I added some fondant for the head, shaped and sculpted it then added a layer of ganache over the Rice Krispies to smooth it out. I inserted a dowel in the centre of the fish from bottom (tail part) with a little sticking out of bottom to help keep it upright.

I drilled a hole (well hubby actually did this part for me) in the centre of two 6" round boards. The reason I used two boards is that I wanted to have enough depth to keep the dowel in for support so the fish can stand upright.
I then stood the fish up onto the boards and inserted the dowel into the hole in the middle of the boards. It felt a bit wobbly so I secured it with a wooden skewer inserted into the broad then the side of the fish. It was going no where after that!

I then painstakingly cut the little scales from fondant with 3 different sizes round circle cutters and added them on to the fish one by one. I cut and shaped the fins, dried them and then glued them on to the body. The entire fish was covered in white fondant.
I left it to dry overnight then the next day I placed it onto my 8" round ganache cake. I airbrushed all the colour and detail having my Koi fish photo in front of me as reference. Then I covered the cake around the fish with aqua colored fondant and rolled little pieces of fondest to look like water waves and glued them on.
I secured my pre made flower, which I tried to make to look like the flower in the photo but in my mad rush to finish the cake on time it turned a little different. Air brushed a little blue here and there on the aqua fondant for a better effect.

Finally it was done, finished. My vision came to life, a bit different then I had imagined but still good. Best of all my brother thought I was the best cake ever!I use Bakels fondant.
I purchase most of my supplies from Cake Decorating Solutions Liverpool NSW Australia . My air brush machine is Dinkydoodle by Dawn Butler.