Polaroid Cake

Any Polaroid fans out there? This past weekend my in-laws got together to celebrate my sister-in-law's birthday. She will also be moving soon for a new job, so it was a birthday/going away/congrats on your job kind of party! When my mother-in-law asked me to make a cake, I thought long and hard about a theme. I knew she loved flowers on cakes (as she loves lots of icing). I wanted to incorporate that, but also something that was personal to her.

After a few different ideas, I decided to go with Polaroid cameras. Sara loves Polaroid cameras, she has quite a few. The only problem was...could I really make one? I was starting to worry that I might have taken on more than I could handle.  I think even my husband was a little worried it was a bit too challenging. About a week before the party, I started working on the fondant camera. I found a picture of a camera online and just started molding the fondant. The camera turned out better than I thought! 

The cake baking and decorating also went smoother than I expected. Usually when I'm decorating and baking at another location, I end up forgetting things and having lots of challenges! Thankfully, though, this weekend went off without any major issues. The cake was a big hit with Sara, and the rest of my in-laws! I used a slightly different vanilla cake recipe, I think it made a big difference. I will be featuring that on my blog later this week. Today, though, I wanted to share the basic steps I used to create this camera topper.

Fondant Polaroid camera tools:

• Crisco (for greasing surface to keep fondant from sticking
• Fondant smoother
• Black fondant
• White fondant
• Red, yellow, and blue fondant (or dye)
• Metal spatula for cutting fondant
• Fondant roller
• Water
• Paintbrush

Fondant Polaroid Camera instructions:

• Start with black fondant and mold into a corner shape, use the fondant smoother to flatten out

• Use a meta spatula to cut straight edges of the bottom and back

• Form a piece of white fondant (approximately the same size, but thinner) to fit on top of the black portion
• Attach the fondant using gum glue (fondant or gum paste pieces dissolved in water), you can paint the gum glue on to the back of the white piece

• Roll out a small ball of black fondant that will be about the size of a lens for the camera
• Flatten the ball with a rounded edge tool, making a circular hole in the center

• Attach the lens to the center of the vertical white portion using a paintbrush and gum glue
• Roll out red fondant to around 1/16 in
• Cut out a small circle of red fondant
• Attach this circle to the left side of the lens using gum glue ( I stuck it on using a toothpick to stick into place)

• Roll out black fondant paper thin
• Create a small rectangle out of the fondant (approx 3X the width of the small red circle)
• Attach the black rectangle to the camera, right above the red circle
• Create a small black square out of the black fondant (just a bit smaller than the lens)
• Form a small black circle to complete the features of the camera, this should be just slightly smaller than the red circle
• Attach the black square and circle to the camera, to the right of the lens

• The topper is really starting to look like a camera, but there's a little more to do! Next, roll out white fondant into a thin rope. Attach that to the front of the lens with gum glue
• Roll out a thin piece of white fondant and color on the red, yellow, and blue stripes (the total strip should be half as thick as the diameter of the lens)
• Cut out the red/yellow/blue strip and attach to the front of the camera
• You can create an optional view finder using a chunk of black fondant. I just played around with molding it until I got something that resembled it, really this won't be seen much. I attached with gum glue and let it rest on something overnight so the finder would stay in place.
• To finish out the look, I created a 1/16 rectangle of white fondant
• I rolled out black fondant paper thin and placed a square on the white rectangle - this created the cute film

I loved working on this camera, and really enjoyed creating the final product! Here's the cake:

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial! Don't forget to check back later this week for the vanilla cake recipe. Also, I'm hoping to share my next installation of my I Dream of Ice Cream series. Anyone who read about my ice cream fiasco last week will be glad to know I'm once again trying a cake batter recipe! Make sure and follow my blog, or follow me on social media, to keep up with my latest posts.