Diamond Ring Cake

My husband's baby brother is getting married this month. I am so looking forward to watching those two lovebirds get hitched!

As we've been preparing for the big day, it has been so fun dreaming up wedding decorations and centerpieces for the rehearsal dinner. I'm looking forward to posting pictures of the wedding in all of its glory soon. Until then, I wanted to share an idea for a cake that I came up with as a surprise for the soon-to-be newlyweds on the day of their engagement.

Now, please be kind. All of these pictures were taken pre-blog, pre-cake decorating class, and pre-nice camera. I don't have detailed pictures because I wasn't preparing a tutorial at that time, but hopefully these pictures will give you a rough idea of how to recreate this cake on your own.

When I started dreaming up this cake, I wanted to create a cake that replicated the diamond solitaire look, but I refused to go purchase special cake pans. So I worked with what I had on hand. I started with a bundt pound cake and two 9-inch round butter cakes. I didn't push the work limit here, as you can see. It was all from mixes I had in my pantry and the icing came out of tubs (see below?).

Once you've baked the three cakes, before you go any further, stack your two butter cakes, spreading icing in between.

To create the shapes, I sketched the diamond shape onto a piece of paper, measuring so that it would not exceed the size of the round cakes, or overwhelm the bundt cake. Ordinarily, I'm of the belief that there's no such thing as a diamond that's too big, but in this case I had to make a concession.

I've created a paper template for you to use as a guide for the "diamond" portion of the cake. You can download it here: http://www.scribd.com/doc/31507430

Cut out the paper diamond template and arrange it on the bundt cake to your liking. Then, using a sharp knife, cut out the portion of the bundt cake where the diamond will rest inside. This will give the cake a more diamond "setting" look. Now place your template on the double layer butter cake. Cut around the template, using a sharp knife. Eat the scraps. (The how-to said so, so you've probably got no choice...)

NOTE: I chose not to level my two butter cakes because the curvature of the cake made it look more diamond-esque.

Using a large flat spatula, slide the double-layer "diamond" into the cut-out bundt cake. Icing is next. If you choose a light and dark color, be sure to ice the lighter one first, otherwise you'll end up dragging the dark color into your light icing and kick yourself. I chose cream cheese and chocolate so that the diamond portion would stand out better, and because it's what I had in my pantry. I'm sure you could go all Wilton-y and dye the color to look like an actual golden ring, if you wanted to. (If you do, please send me pictures! I'd love to see it!)

Learn from my mistake though. I got all excited and jumped right into this project without thinking about how I would store it. This is a BIG cake, and once it's iced, it's very difficult to move onto another platter. In my case, I made the cake the night before, and then had to hide it so it wouldn't spoil the surprise of the big proposal the next day.

My mom and I laughed and fought this cake for a while but finally came up with this:

Salad dressing bottles, lemon juice, soy sauce, marinades...anything that could hold plastic wrap high enough so it wouldn't fall into the icing. I stored this on the floor in my closet and I was terrified that my husband would come home that night, miss the hamper and demolish the cake with his dirty clothes.

It survived though. And the happy couple loved it...

The small diamond rings are made using engagement ring candy molds and candy melts I picked up at our local craft store.