Mailbox Cake

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Baking the Cake:

2 x 8 lbs Yo’s Ultimate Chocolate Cake

Icing The Cake:

2 x Simple Syrup
2 x Italian Meringue Buttercream
Americolor Electric Pink
3 cups Cinnamon Heart Candies
3 cups White & Pink Heart Candies

Covering The Cake:

5 lbs White Fondant
1 lb Red Fondant
1 lb Pink Fondant
1/2 lb Black Fondant
Americolor Electric Purple
Icing Sugar
Vegetable Shortening
CMC Powder

Decorating The Cake:

Clear Piping Gel
Royal Icing
1/2 lb Gum Paste

Item Name:	Availability:
2 x 11” x 15” Rectangle Cake Pans
1 x 6” Round Cake Pan (You won’t be baking with this, we’re just using it as a guide.)
Ruler
Serrated Knife
Small Serrated Knife
Icing Spatula	Add to Cart -
Small Offset Spatula	Add to Cart -
Offset Spatula	Add to Cart -
Clay Extruder	Add to Cart -
Ateco Heart Cutter Set
Fondant Smoother
Paring Knife
French Rolling Pin
Fondant Rolling Pin	Add to Cart -
#805 Round Piping Tip
#11 Round Piping Tip
Food Writers
Brushes
Stamp
Wax Sealer or Buttons
Simple Syrup Squeeze Bottle	Add to Cart -

Preparation

Bake Cakes

Prepare your Ultimate Chocolate Cake batter and divide evenly between your two prepared 11” x 15” rectangular cake pans. Bake at 350 degrees for about 1 hour and 15 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean. Cool cakes completely in their pans, allowing them to rest on a wire rack.

Prepare Buttercream

Prepare 2x the recipe of Italian Meringue Buttercream. Once complete, dye your buttercream a bright pink using your Americolor Electric Pink food gel and set aside. If you have a StayBowlizer, this is a great place to use one to keep your bowl in place while you mix!

Prepare Simple Syrup

Prepare 2x the recipe of Simple Syrup and set aside at room temperature.

Level Cakes

Once your cakes are completely cool, remove them from their pans and level with a ruler and serrated knife. (Make sure to save your cake humps!) Continue with your serrated knife and ruler to cut in half horizontally, leaving you with four rectangle cakes. Then, cut each rectangle in half lengthwise, so that you’re left with eight 15” x 5.5” long rectangle pieces.

It’s Simple!

Shower all of your cake layers with simple syrup. Allow the simple syrup to soak in completely before moving on to the next step.

Make Room For A Surprise

Create a paper template that is about 8.5” x 2.5”. Then, using a ruler and your serrated knife, place the paper template over five layers of cake and use it to cut a ‘secret chamber’ out of the cakes, making sure to leave an even amount of space on all four sides.

Begin Stacking Your Mailbox

Place one full rectangular cake (that hasn’t been cut out) on a cake board. Lay your 8.5” x 2.5” paper template in the middle of this cake and begin icing around the template using your small offset spatula. Remove the template so that there is a blank, un-iced space left in the center of the cake. Then, begin stacking your ‘secret chamber’ layers and filling them with buttercream. Keep repeating this process until you’ve stacked all five ‘secret chamber’ layers.

Note: If the cake is beginning to get too tall, I found it easier to stack half of my cake layers, move onto the next step (filling the chamber with candies!) and then repeat again.

Fill Your Mailbox With Love

Once you’ve stacked and iced six layers of cake (one bottom layer & five secret compartment layers), begin filling your ‘secret chamber’ with cinnamon hearts and heart candies, alternating candies as you fill each cake layer until you reach the top.

Note: Make sure your ‘secret chamber’ is completely clean of buttercream by removing any excess with your small offset spatula before filling the centre with candies.

Finish Stacking Your Cakes

Stack and ice your remaining two rectangle layers to close up the chamber.

Note: Those surprise candies can be pretty heavy! If you notice that the sides of your cake are starting to droop, place two cake boards against the sides that are losing their shape, and tape around the boards to secure them. This will act as a support to keep the cake together while chilling.

Crumb Coat & Chill

Crumb coat all sides with Italian Meringue buttercream using your icing spatula & chill in the fridge for about 30 minutes.

Flip It, Crumb Coat & Chill It

Once your cake is completely chilled, flip the entire cake upside down so that the top is now the bottom. (This means that the two fully-rectangular cake layers are now on the bottom, followed by five secret chamber layers, and one full layer on top.) Give your cake a second crumb coat and chill for another 20 minutes.

Note: Make sure to remove the boards after you flip, and before your crumb coat! (Take this out if it’s not in the video.)

Create That Signature Mailbox Shape

Remove your chilled cake from the fridge. Using a 6” round cake pan as your guide, press the pan up against the short side of the mailbox (which will be your front & back sides) and gently trace around the top of that circular pan with your serrated knife until the shape begins to resemble the curved top of a mailbox. Set your pan aside and, working with one corner at a time, begin to round out the top of your cake completely, giving it that signature mailbox shape.

Ice & Chill & Ice & Chill (Yes, twice!)

Using your icing spatula, ice your mailbox with pink buttercream & chill in the fridge for about 20 minutes. To help keep its shape, ice the entire cake once more using the remaining pink buttercream and chill again. Once the buttercream is chilled and firm, smooth out any ridges and set aside.

Colour Your Fondant

Separate 1 lb of your white fondant into two ½ lb portions. Using a small ball of pink fondant (about less than an oz), gently knead the pink fondant into one of your white fondant portions until you have a soft pink hue. Take your second ½ lb portion and slowly mix in your Americolour Electric Purple gel, gently kneading until the colour is fully incorporated. Once both colours are to your liking, roll the fondant into a ball and cover it tightly with plastic wrap. Store in a cool, dry place.

Note: This step should be done the day before to save time.

Cover The Front Of Your Mailbox

Roll out your black fondant until it is about ⅛ of an inch thick. Cover one of the thinner sides of your cake with the rolled-out fondant. This will now be the front of your mailbox. Smooth your fondant to this side using your fondant smoother. Using a sharp paring knife, cut to the exact shape of the mailbox, making sure to remove any excess.

Cover The Sides

With your remaining 4 lbs of white fondant, roll out a big rectangle until it is about ⅛ of an inch thick and large enough to cover the width and length of your mailbox. Drape the fondant over the top and around both sides of the mailbox, smoothing it to your cake with your fondant smoother - making sure to start from the top and then moving down to each side. Remove any excess with your sharp paring knife.

Don’t Forget The Back!

Roll out your bright pink fondant (not the soft pink-dyed fondant) to about ⅛ of an inch thick. Cover the back of your mailbox in the same way you covered the front. Make sure to use your fondant smoother to help smooth the pink fondant to this side of the cake, cut it to size using your sharp paring knife and remove any excess.

Extend The Sides

Soften a bit of white fondant with vegetable shortening, then use your clay extruder to create a semi-circle band. (This will be used to create a ‘lip’ around the front of your mailbox, making the front of your mailbox appear more hollow and the sides longer.) Brush a bit of water around the rim of the front of your mailbox, then glue your white fondant band to the edges of the black fondant.

Add The Trim

Repeat the same process as the previous step using your bright pink fondant, softening with vegetable shortening and then creating a semi circle band with your clay extruder. (Unlike the previous step, you will be using this semi-circle band to create a trim around the top the mailbox, at the very back.) Brush a bit of water around the top and side edges of the back of your mailbox, then glue your pink fondant band to the white fondant.

Prepare Your Mailbox Lid

Using your French roller, roll out the remaining red fondant to about ¼ of an inch thick and big enough on all sides to become the “lid” of the mailbox. Chill in the fridge.

Create Your Hearts

Roll out about ½ lb of light pink, bright pink, red & purple fondant as thin as possible. Using four different sizes of your heart cutters, cut hearts out of your coloured fondant, keeping the sizes consistent with each colour. In this case, I chose red to be my biggest heart and actually used a smaller cutter to cut hearts out of the center of each, then light pink was the second largest, then bright pink and finally purple.

Spread A Little Love!

Now comes the fun part! Use all of your fondant hearts to create a pattern over the entire white part of your mailbox, gluing each one on with just a bit of water brushed onto the back before pressing gently onto the mailbox.

Create Your Mailbox Lid

Remove your chilled red fondant from the fridge. Using a ruler, measure the width and height of the front opening of the mailbox and create a paper template with the same dimensions and curve as the cake. Once you’ve created a template, lay the template overtop of your chilled red fondant and cut around it. This piece will become the lid of your mailbox.

Create A Hinge

Before laying your lid in front of the cake, soften a small ball of red fondant with vegetable shortening. Create a band using the circle faceplate on your clay extruder that’s about the same size as the length of the bottom of your lid. Using your sharp paring knife, gently roll your circular band under the knife to create indents every half an inch, giving the overall impression of a “hinge”. Secure your hinge to bottom of the mailbox by brushing it with some water, and then place the lid down in front of it.

Add A Rim Around The Lid

With remaining red fondant, mix in about ½ teaspoon of CMC to help stiffen the fondant. Roll out your red fondant into a long band about the length of the circumference of your mailbox lid and ⅛ of an inch thick. Using your ruler and a sharp paring knife, cut a straight band about ½ inch wide. Brush a bit of water along the outside of the mailbox lid flap and glue your red band along the edge of the mailbox lid so that there’s a bit of an edge sticking up.

Get Your Envelopes Ready

Using your fondant roller, some of your white gumpaste to be as paper-thin as possible. Cut out an envelope with your sharp paring knife, using a real envelope as a template. (Because gumpaste tends to dry very quickly, I suggest to cutting out each envelope one at a time.) Taking apart the envelope, use the flaps as a guide to mark the same lines on your gumpaste envelopes with the tip of your knife. Set aside to dry.

Note: You will need to let this dry for 1-2 days before attaching to your finished cake, so make sure to do this step a few days in advance.

Make Some Postcards Too!

Using the same techniques as in the previous step, roll out your white gumpaste using your fondant roller and cut postcard-sized pieces out. Set aside to dry.

Note: Again, you will need to let this dry for 1-2 days before attaching to your finished cake, so make sure to do this step a few days in advance.

Create Your Mailbox Flag

Create your own rough template of a mailbox flag using a pencil and paper, then cut out your paper template and place it overtop of the rolled-out purple fondant. Dye your remaining gumpaste the same colour of purple as you did with your hearts using your Americolour Electric Purple gel. Using a sharp paring knife, cut around your template to create your mailbox flag and set aside to dry.

Write Some Love Letters

Once your envelopes are fully dry, use your food writers to personalize each envelope with fun return addresses, sweet messages and your loved ones’ names.

Seal The Deal!

Using a wax seal (or buttons if you don’t have any), create little circles with any remaining red fondant and press your seal into the fondant, creating a fun pattern. Attach your ‘wax seals’ to each envelope by brushing on a little clear piping gel. Set aside to dry.

Send Your Postcards

Once your postcards are fully dry, brush a bit of food colouring onto a cleaned, ink-free rubber stamp and stamp your postcards with fun messages or images. Have a bit of fun with this and use whatever stamps you can find!

Attach Your Flag

Once your purple flag is dry, attach it to the cake by piping a small dab of royal icing onto the bottom stick of the flag and pressing it into the side of the cake. (Make sure to hold the flag there until the royal icing begins to set.)

Secure Your Flag

Using your #805 Round Piping Tip and #11 Round Piping Tip, cut out a little “grommet” with your leftover purple fondant and attach with a bit of water over the bottom part of the flag to make it look like the flag is fully attached and secure.

Spread A Little Love!

Scatter your envelopes and postcards around the opening of your mailbox so that it looks like your love letters are spilling out, and enjoy!

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