Calico Cat Cupcake Cake

Bake 48 cupcakes following the recipe on the box. Let them cool. On a large foil covered double thick cardboard, arrange the cupcakes to resemble a cat. You can do a cat head too if you like. Once you get the cupcakes how you want them, dab a little frosting on the bottom of each cupcake and put it back in it's place on the foil tray. This will act as a glue to avoid the cupcakes from sliding around.

Now it's time to ice the cupcakes. Put spoonfuls of icing on top of the cake and with a large spatula, spread it around just as you were icing a regular cake. I used white as a base coat. Next I marked out with a toothpick where the sunglasses would be. The cats on the partyware all had sunglasses on them so this is why I chose to do sunglasses. If you want eyes, just follow your picture example.

This is the fun part! Mix your colors of icing for the fur. I did a pale orange and tan color. When I loaded my icing bag, I filled one side of the bag with orange and the other with tan. The colors will blend together and this is what you want if you are doing a calico. I started at the top and worked my way down. and layered the fur with small strokes in the direction the fur would run on a real cat.

Next I added a nose and mouth with the small round tip. I used a butter knife to ice the black part of the sunglasses and used the star tip to make the rim of the glasses. I used black licorice for the whiskers as piping it on didn't look right. I left a triangle to simulate the inside of the ears which gave them depth because the fur was piped up around the openings.

Use your imagination and have fun! It took a while for the fur so make sure you give your self enough time. The best compliment I could have received was a 4 year old at the party asked her mom why I would put fur on the cake!