Groom's Deer Head Cake (or is it a Buck or Stag Head?) - See how it was made.

I'm not sure if this should be call a Deer, Buck or Stag Head Cake.  Whatever you call it, this is what the bride decide would be the perfect cake for her hunting obsessed groom.  

I started with a outline drawing of the deer that was a combination of several drawings I found.  This is the antler.

And the head.

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After I had the outline, I loaded the image into the CookieCad.com app to generate a file that I could use on my 3D printer.  Below is one of the cutters being printed.  I printed one cutter for just the outline and one cutter with all the features.  Yes, I could have just used a paper templet, but then I wouldn't be able to use my nifty Creality Ender 3 V2 printer.  If you want to read more about 3D printing, click HERE.

When it came time to make the head out of fondant, I started with the antlers because they looked the easiest.  I created an armature of the antler shape using wire and bamboo skewers.  The antlers were a little fragile looking, so that is why I added the armature for support.  Once the armature was ready, I mixed brown fondant with some CMC powder.  The CMC powder (also called Gum-Tex and Tylose powder) makes the fondant harden into a rock-like substance.  The more powder you add, the harder the fondant will become.  Once the brown fondant was mixed with the CMC, I added a little bit of black and gray fondant and marbled the colors together.

I used the antler cutter to cut a piece of brown fondant and pushed the armature into it.

Then I cut another fondant antler and used it to cover the front of the armature.  I used a bit of water to glue the two layers of fondant together.

A dresden tool was used to score some grooves into the fondant to give it a more realistic look. (They kind of look like snapping fingers don't they??)

The head came next.  I started with a brown fondant base and then just started layering the other pieces on top of it.

Once I got to this point I placed the head on an 8" foam dummy so it would dry with a curved shape to match the cake.  You might also notice some accents/facial features on this photo of the head didn't make the final cut.  At some point I decided I didn't like the blackish-brown "hair" around the ears, so that got pulled off and replaced it with something different.  The face was a work in progress.  I would put things on and take them off till I got something I liked.

When I started assembling the cake, I attached a bamboo skewer to the back of the deer head using melted candy melts.  I also used a chocolate freeze spray  which hardens the melted chocolate in seconds.  This stuff is great.  Without the spray, it would take 30 minutes for the chocolate to harden.  I attached the antlers to the head with the same melted candy melts. 

After the final spritz with the chocolate freeze spray, the head and antlers went onto the cake.  I secured the head to the cake and the cake drum with more melted chocolate and a ball of green fondant.   (See at this point I removed the fringy hair from around the ears.)

Final step was to add some greenery around the head.  I wanted the deer to look like he was walking through the forest rather than dead and mounted.

So here is the cake all finished.  I hope the groom likes it!

Happy Decorating,

Carol