Easy Unicorn Cake Decoration You Can Make At Home

The unicorn often inspires a lot of beautiful ideas. It can inspire one into making caps to be worn by kids, used in decorating kid’s room, toys, pictures and objects among others. Among the inspiring ideas that our beloved unicorn can inspire are cakes. A unicorn cake idea will be very exciting for kids because of its unique longhorn and beautiful ears which is every child’s delight.

If you want to surprise your child, throw a unicorn party or make someone’s fantasy come true, I have got the perfect procedure for you to achieve that without going overboard. Let me show you how to make a simple unicorn decoration for any cake and make anyone feel special on their favourite day.

What Does The Unicorn Represent?

Unicorns are such uncommon and stunning animals. They represent purity, confidence, magic, strength and truth. A wide range of societies has expounded on them since forever and today, they can be found in any place on the planet since they live in the brilliant domains of the creative mind. Meanings related to the unicorn are blamelessness, female vitality, and enchantment. It isn’t exceptional to see unicorn references in dream books, youngsters’ books, movies and other legendary stories. This is on the grounds that the unicorn is an entrancing legendary creature that enthrals our creative mind.

What Makes Unicorn-Themed Cakes Special?

The fact that items with unicorn themes and inspirations seem to be everywhere at the moment is quite intriguing and almost everyone wants in. These beautiful creatures that stand tall and poop rainbows while spreading magic wherever they go are just amazing. With their bright colours and a fascinating element, the unicorn trend is the perfect blend of nostalgia and fun that adults and children can all enjoy.

Imagine having a unicorn-themed cake for that special event, I can bet you will have heads turn while also fulfilling the fantasy of the celebrant. Trust me, if you or anyone you know love unicorns or all it represents, you will definitely love the ideas of a unicorn-inspired cake for that special cake. Don’t worry, it’s not a difficult feat and you can achieve it with no stress so let’s get baking.

How To Make The Perfect Unicorn Cake Decoration For Your Cake

Whipping up your own beautiful unicorn decorated cake is actually a piece of cake, lol. It is not very different from other ideas of cake making that you know and you can pull it through in no time. The unicorn-decorated cakes just have a different design but still on the same cake that you are familiar with. This is actually becoming very popular because a lot of people are fascinated by the design and even what the animal represents.

What you need

Making a unicorn cake decoration involves the normal cake baking process which I will talk about here. The only thing different is the unicorn design which will be placed on the cake after you are done baking and icing. Also, making the unicorn horn, ears, and eye design does not really require any special material.

If you have been longing to make a unicorn cake decoration, this is your best chance as you will be taken through a step-by-step guide on how to make your very own homemade unicorn cake decoration for any occasion like celebrating your kid’s birthday or anyone’s special day. So let’s start with making the cake itself.

Ingredients to make your cake base

Remember that there are no special materials required for making a unicorn cake. This is because a unicorn cake is just your regular cake with the unicorn design. To make the cake base you need the following ingredients to bake the cake:

125g of flour

120g of sugar

1 stick of butter

5 large eggs

1/2 cup of milk

1 teaspoon full of baking powder

1 cup of rainbow sprinkles

Pinch of salt

1 tablespoon of vanilla extract

1 teaspoon of almond extracts

A capful of colour and preservative (optional)

Steps to making your cake base

You must distinguish between wet and dry materials to make your work simple and tidy so start by adding the required flour, salt and baking powder together and mix thoroughly until they look fine.
Mix the butter and sugar very well. You can get this done using an electric or hand mixer to ensure that it is thoroughly mixed. Ensure that you scrape down the sides while mixing to get everything.
Beat the eggs well and pour into the mixer while stirring.

Get the flour you have mixed and add it bit by bit into the bowl and continue stirring.
Get the milk and dissolve in warm water if you are using a powder one. Pour it into the mixing bowl alongside the flour and keep stirring.
Once that is done, add the flavour of your choice. In this case, you should add your vanilla flavour or almond extracts then mix thoroughly. The flavour is added to make it smell and taste nice.

Add the colour if you choose. This is just to make the insides look nice if people slice in.
The preservative of your choice can also be added now if you want the cake to stay longer without getting stale.
Mix for an extra 7 minutes or until it looks creamy and smooth.

Pour in the rainbow sprinkles to give it an added fun look and even taste.
Use a spatula to turn it a little and be gentle so the sprinkles don’t break.
Grease the baking pan with butter and dust in flour to remove excess and prevent it from sticking to the pan. It’s best to pour batter into 3 or more different pans so that you can layer them up for a natural-looking unicorn design.

Preheat the oven for like 10 minutes (best to do this before rounding up the cake mixing process though).
Pour the batter into the pans and place in the preheated oven.
Bake the cake in your oven for 35 minutes or until it becomes golden. Do not allow it to turn brown before taking it out. Or better still, insert a toothpick right in the middle and if it comes out clean, the cake is ready.

Take out the cake from the oven and get it out of the pan.
Put the different layers of the cake in a place to cool before creaming.

Making the buttercream:

Buttercream is a soft mixture of butter and sugar used inside and on top of cakes. This is a good addition as it would make you cake yummy to taste and also improve the design. Ingredients for the buttercream include:

1 stick of unsalted butter
1/4 cup of icing sugar
3 1/2 tablespoons of milk

1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Edible colour

Preparation

To make the buttercream, you need either an electric whisk or a mixer to beat the mixture.
Get a bowl and add the butter and icing sugar. Use the mixer to properly mix them until it gives a fine texture.
Gradually add the vanilla extract and milk. The milk will make the frosting smooth and spreadable. So you can always add more milk till you get your desired consistency.

Keep stirring till everything is properly mixed.
Separate them in plates and add colour to the smaller portions just for an extra design you may need.

Creaming your cake

Now that your cake is cool and ready for creaming, level the top well so that the cake can sit comfortably on each one.

Assemble the cake on a cake board and start by applying buttercream on the top of the first round of cake using a piping bag.
Add another layer of cake on it and press it to hold tightly, keep doing so for as many layers of the cake as you have available.
For the last cake that would sit on top, don’t level the top as you would want it to have that top-of-cake-look.

It is at this stage that you should put on your design cap. So start by covering the whole cake with the buttercream while using a spatula to smooth it out.
Allow it to sit for some time so that it would turn a bit hard. You can put it in a refrigerator for about 10 minutes. Ensure that all layers are covered with buttercream.

Making your unicorn’s horn, ear, mane and eyes

Your Unicorn decoration is the most important part of this guide because it is from the unicorn design that the cake gets its name and of course, magic. So let’s start with making your unicorn’s horn. For this, you need To make your unicorn horn you need:

To get the horn, all you need to do is to

Get your lollipop stick or wooden skewer ready. The stick will help you hold the fondant which you will wrap around it to form the unicorn horn that is long and has a sharp edge.
Make your fondant into long strips and wrap them around the lollipop stick until it forms the shape of a unicorn horn. Be sure to make the base of the horn to have more wraps and appear wider. This width will make it to balance properly on your cake. Leave a little stick space hanging at the edge so that you can stick it into the cake.

Get edible colour and paint the horn gold or anything of your choice.
You can use a variety of colours to make it look better.

For the ears and eyes:

You can also make the unicorn’s ear using your fondant by shaping them to the way you want them to look and also giving them your desired colour.
You also need to make the eyes with your fondant. They will be fixed to the front side of the cake to give it that unique unicorn look.

For the mane:

Remember the buttercream you added colours to in a smaller bowl? This is the part where it comes in handy.
Depending on the extra colours you added (I will recommend at least three fancy colours), pour them into piping bags if you haven’t.
Starting from the top of the cake, stick to the edge (or centre depending on where you want the mane to start from) and drop a mix of the coloured buttercream one at a time.

Go all the way down the sides of the second and third (or more) cakes which you have all layered up.
You have to do this neatly just so you will get the perfect look of the unicorn’s mane just like the image below.

For the finishing touches:

When all has been set, place the horn and the ears made from the fondant and lollipop stick on your cake and sprinkle with glitter if available.
You should also add the eyes using the shape that you made for that purpose.

Once this is done, your unicorn cake is ready!
Set your cake aside while you go about setting up the rest of the things needed for the party.

See, not all that difficult to pull through!

Alternatives to making the full unicorn cake

Well, let’s just say you are not up to making the whole unicorn horn, ears and all that, here are four alternatives you can try and still get that unicorn theme.

After assembling all your cakes together and smearing buttercream all around it, use a large cookie-cutter shaped in the form of a unicorn and press it down on the top of the cake. You can also do the same on the sides if you choose. Then go ahead with coloured buttercream to fill in the line created. This will also give you a pretty unicorn sitting right on top of your cake
Use a unicorn cake fondant mould to form a unicorn. Peel it out once the fondant is dry and place your little unicorns on top of the cake to get the party started.

Simply buy the cake pan that is shaped as the head of a unicorn and pour your batter into it when you are ready to pop it into the oven. This way, your cake would come out already made and you will only need to use your buttercream to fill in the design and necessary details.
Just purchase a unicorn and rainbow edible cake topper like this one and stick it to the top of your cake to give you that perfect unicorn picture for your party and also have that touch of magic in it.

Note that your cake baking materials may not involve what’s mentioned here since the main focus is the unicorn design. You can add your unicorn design to different types of cakes which may also require other ingredients. The most important is that whichever cake you choose, try to make the horn, ears and eyes out of the fondant and attach them where necessary while drawing on the mane.

Conclusion

Don’t you think unicorns just make everything better? Trust me, the kids or whoever is going to be getting the unicorn cake will be excited if you present the cake to them on their special day. You should also have learnt that making the unicorn horn is easy. I can bet that seeing the longhorn stand elegantly on your cake in addition to the ears and eyes fixed in the proper place will give a welcoming feeling to your kids and guests. They will sure know some things the unicorn represents and also reminds them of.

So, do you think it’s something you can try? Let’s hear your thoughts below!