Mario Cake 1-2

I was going for a Super Mario theme for Ryan's birthday, and thought it would be cool to have a 1UP Mushroom and Question Block to go on top of the cake. I could have made these out of cake, but they'd be way more stable and easy to make out of Rice Krispie treats. I had never carved/made anything out of RKT before so thought this would be a good opportunity to do so.

I followed the recipe on the Rice Krispies box, but instead of putting them into a rectangular pan, I figured I'd make it easier on myself and put them into a couple of dishes that could pass as the top and bottom of the mushroom. Ryan happened to have a little metal 1UP mushroom which I used as a guide. This was extremely helpful in getting the proportions accurate. Here is the carved result:

The carving was surprisingly easy and went much better than I expected. For the Question Block I used a square dish as a mold and then carved the sides straight and square. Once the carving was complete, I covered everything in buttercream icing, colored the fondant to match the traditional Mario colors, and covered the pieces with the fondant. 

I'm really happy with the way this turned out! I think the colors are great, and the lines are pretty clean. It was a bit challenging to cover the top of the mushroom with fondant, as I had to wrap it over the bottom too. It was a bit of a balancing act, trying to cover and smooth the bottom while not squishing and smudging the already covered top. Needless to say, the white dots covered up some visible mistakes :).

Here's a shot of my messy kitchen counter just after completing the mushroom. Note the *tiny* amount of counter space I have to work with :*(. The mushroom carving is sitting on a styrofoam dummy I bought, intending to practice covering it with fondant. This is the first time it's been 'used' so that I could see the proportion of the mushroom & block to the cake I was going to make.

Also note the numerous printouts of Mario reference. These came in super handy!