Wild West Cowboy Hat Cake

Who doesn’t love a good hoedown, a Wild Western shin dig, a rockin’ rodeo… I know I do!! Yeee harrrrr!!

I remember back to a Wild West party I attended at a conference held on Lindeman Island in the Whitsunday Islands years ago, it was such a hoot, we all rocked up dressed in our Western gear, there was line dancing, limbo, hay bales, those rudely named cowboy shots and a bucking bull. Later in the evening I bravely got on the bucking thing, feeling pretty confident I could ride it given my athletic training, ahem, but before I knew it I was face first on the floor mat… bucked off! haha

So when I was asked to make the birthday cake for a 21^st Wild West party I was pretty darn excited. “Maybe they will have a bucking bull”, I thought, “I should start training now”…. but first, I should think about this cake.. yes.

I did some research and experimented a bit until I figured out how to achieve a huge, realistic looking cowboy hat cake. Definitely chocolate MUD for this cake, oh yes siree, so I started out by baking 3 x 12” round rich chocolate mud cakes. Then started on the brim of the hat.

Making cowboy hat cake brim

For the brim I cut out a template with baking paper to the size and shape I wanted, then cut the shape out on a thick layer of rolled chocolate gum paste. Then I curled up the sides of the brim and held them in shape with cardboard tubes, like the ones from a roll of glad wrap. Set this aside for a couple of days to harden fully.

I cut a cardboard cake board to the exact size I wanted my hat, not the size of the 12” cake, but the size of the head bit, it will be an oval shape. I stacked the cakes on the board on top of one another and filled each layer with dark chocolate ganache. I am smelling that as I type… mmmm that is so good.

Now for the exciting bit!! Get your carving knife out, like you’re removing a gun from your holster, point it at your cake and say, “Do you feel lucky? Well, do ya, punk?”… then swagger towards it…. AND CARVE THE LIVING DAYLIGHTS OUT OF IT!!!   Made my day! hehehe

Cowboy hat cake carved and ganached front view

Cowboy hat cake carved and ganached

Once you’ve carved it to the shape you want, ganache the entire surface of the cake. It’s now ready to cover in fondant. Use the same coloured fondant as the brim so it all matches, then place the cake on the brim and there it is, starting to look like a cowboy hat. I don’t know about you but after all that I feel a trip to the saloon coming on 😉

Once your cake is completely dry you can start painting it with a darker brown around the edges and in the grooves to get that aged leather look.

Make a fancy head band out of fondant with a badgey thing at the front. Make a sheriffs badge out of a star and some wanted posters (I used edible images to make my wanted posters). I made some old looking rope out of gum paste for the cake board as well. There you have it, a seriously good looking cowboy hat!!

When I delivered the cake to the party, the room was full of hay bales, Wild West memorabilia on the walls, the saloon was well stocked… It looked amazing… I looked around for the bucking bull.. but I couldn’t find it.. hmmmm no bull 😉

As I left them to finish setting up, and locate the bucking bull, I did a little gallop to my car smiling to myself at the thought of being 21 again.

Thank you for reading this post. I would love to hear from you, so send me a little message on my blog and tell me how you got on with your cowboy hat cake, or share your bucking bull stories haha, or just say ‘Hi’ 🙂

EAT – CELEBRATE – ENJOY!!!