Boofy Cakes

This year was the second annual Chili Cook Off at the church! Being the weekend before the Super bowl, it was all football themed! I was really excited to enter my vegetarian chili again this year. Last year I placed 4th out of 13 chilis. I was rather surprised and flattered that my meatless chili did so well. Unfortunately this year I didn’t  place that high but all of the chilis came really close with the same amount of votes. 

Just like last year they had a bake sale at the cook off. Only this year, instead of benefiting the local firefighters, the bake sale was for the church’s youth group. The bakery where I worked donated all of their leftovers to the bake sale again this year. I stopped by the bakery before the cook off to pack up the sweets to deliver to the church. I donated a chocolate football cake covered in fudge that I made special for the occasion. I was excited to see that it sold fast!

Football cake

I used the Wilton football cake pan to make this cake. Most of the Wilton pans are designed to use just one cake mix. If you’re using a scratch recipe, it may need to be adjusted for this size pan. Make sure to rotate the cake a couple times in your oven. Since the middle is deeper, the points will bake much faster. Rotating the cake will help prevent the points from burning before the middle is done. After the cake was completely cooled, I covered it with a fudge buttercream. I made a half recipe which was perfect with this size cake. I creamed one cup of butter in my mixer. While the butter beats I combined 3 tablespoons of cocoa powder with 1 tablespoon of vegetable oil. I used a tiny whisk to combine to a smooth paste. I added the chocolate mixture to the butter along with a teaspoon of vanilla and combined. Then I slowly added one pound of powdered sugar on a slow speed. You can add a table spoon here and there of milk until it is the desired consistency. I used a small offset spatula to spread the fudge over my football. Make sure it goes all the way down the sides to the board. It doesn’t need to be a perfect icing job. When you’re done, take a paper towel to wipe off the extra icing that piles up at the base of the cake on the board. Let the cake sit for about 15 to 20 minutes. While it sits the fudge develops a very thin crust. You can then take a paper towel and lay it over the cake. Gently rub your hand over the towel without moving the towel around. This will help smooth out lines and bumps to give you a smooth finish that almost looks like it was covered in fondant! To make the lines on the football, I used some fondant that was leftover from a previous cake. But you can pipe on the lines using some white frosting too! You can color the frosting or fondant so that it matches your team colors! You can also show team spirit by writing the team name on the cake!

If you don’t have the football pan, you can get them at the craft stores. Michael’s and JoAnn’s both have 40% off coupons in the Sunday paper or you can get them on their websites online and print them. You can also use the football pan as a Jello mold, you can bake bread in it to make a football shaped sub sandwich, all kinds of fun treats for your Super Bowl party!

Don’t want to buy the pan? You can carve your own football out of cake. I would suggest using two cake mixes in a 9×13 pan and bake. Once it’s cooled, cut the cake in half so that you have two 9×6.5 pieces. Spread some of the fudge on one of the pieces and then place the second on top. Freeze the cake for an hour or two. Carving cakes are much easier when the cake is cold. Using a serrated knife, carefully cut the corners off to make a sort of diamond shape. Slowly cut away at the cake until it starts to resemble a football. It’s better to take off not enough than too much! Once you have your desired shape, put back into the freezer for an hour. Next you will apply a thin layer of frosting called a crumb coat, or dirty icing. This thin layer of icing will lock in the crumbs so that they don’t show through in your final layer of icing. Once you’ve applied your thin layer of icing, you’ll want to pt it back in the fridge or freezer for about 1 minutes or so until the icing has stiffened. Then you’re set to finish icing your cake as I described above. 

It will be the highlight of your super bowl party!

Happy baking!