Chinese Take Out Box made out of Cake

My niece is crazy for Chinese food (Lo Mein in particular), and her favorite restaurant is named China Moon.  So for her birthday I made her cake that looks like a Chinese take-out box filled with Lo Mein Noodles!

On the back of the box it has what I think/hope is the word Noodle written in Chinese.

On the sides I have Enjoy and Thank You.

And the top is just noodles, noodles, and more noodles.  Plus a few fondant veggies.

Construction started with a take-out box shaped cake.  I angled the sides of a 6" square cake to give it the sloped look, and I placed the cake upside down on a cardboard sheet.  (I  thought it would be easier to attach the fondant with the cake in this position.)  Next I printed a paper templet of a take-out box to exactly match the dimensions of my cake.  I worked on each side individually.  I cut the fondant to match the templet and then placed the fondant on the cake.  I was hoping my fondant "flaps" would dry and hold this position when I flipped the cake over, but no such luck.

The two, smaller side panels of fondant went on easy.  I also put some parchment paper under the flaps to keep them from sticking to the cardboard,

But the other two panels, being larger, gave me some trouble.  I couldn't lift them and put them on the cake without them getting all stretched out of shape.

So I cut a piece of cardboard, and wrapped the fondant it around it so I could transfer the fondant to the cake.  I put parchment paper between the overlapping pieces of fondant to keep them from sticking to each other.

Then with everything all neatly folded up, I positioned it on the cake and then unfolded the flaps into their correct position.  One edge looks a little wonky, but I made that edge a little larger than necessary so I could trim it even with the cardboard base of the cake.

So here are all the panels in place.  In hindsight I should have dusted the edges with a little brown powder food color - just to give the edges more definition - but I forgot.  Oops...

I decided I didn't like the flaps sticking out straight, so I propped them up hoping they would dry, and stay in that position.  They didn't!!

When I flipped the cake right-side-up, the flaps immediately started to droop.  But no worries, I just cut some pieces of out of cardboard cake rounds and stuck them under the flaps to hold them upright.  You can't see it, but the cardboard support is under the covered board on top of the cake.

Then I just started making the noodles.  I used my trusty Ace Extruder and just squeezed out tons of noodles.  Making the noodles was actually the easiest part of this cake construction.

For the chopsticks I just rolled gumpaste around bamboo skewers.

Sorry I forgot to take pictures of the other stuff, but for the veggies I just cut the shapes from orange and green colored fondant.  Nothing fancy there.  For the fortune cookies I cut out gum paste circles, pinched one side together, stuffed the ends with a little cling wrap to keep them open, and then draped the circle over the edge of a cup to give them that fortune cookie shape.  Easy peasy.

So Happy Birthday, Laura.  I hope you like your noodles!


Happy Decorating,

Carol

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Supply List: 

Mona Lisa Fondant
Wilton Tylose Powder
Black 10" Cake Drum
Fondarific Black Fondant
Fondarific Red Fondant
Razor Slicer
ACE Food Safe Extruder