‘Fish’ cake

Method

1. Put a sponge on your chosen cake stand or serving plate. Spread a little buttercream on top, then add the other sponge to create a sandwich. Use a little more buttercream to crumb coat the cakes – spread a very thin layer of buttercream over the whole cake. The top wants to be fully coated, but it doesn’t matter too much about the sides being very neat. Put in the fridge to firm up for 15 minutes.
2. Divide the remaining buttercream equally into 2 bowls and colour one pink and one orange. Fit a plain 12mm piping nozzle into each piping bag, then fill one with the pink buttercream and the other with the orange buttercream.
3. Starting on the side of the cake, pipe blobs of icing in a vertical line, alternating between the colours. Depending on how deep your sponge is and how big your piping nozzle is you may get 3, 4 or 5 blobs. Get a little mug of hot water, dip a teaspoon into the water, then dry and use the back of it to drag through each blob, each time in the same direction, to create the appearance of fish scales.
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4. Pipe another vertical line of blobs with alternating colours to those before, just overlapping the previous line, then drag the teaspoon through each one. Continue doing this until the whole cake is covered in alternating colours of icing. Use the same method to cover the top of the cake too; just leave a little area uncovered for the face.
5.  Use the red fondant to create a mouth, tail and 2 fins. There’s no right or wrong way to do this – just use it like playdough to create shapes you’re happy with. Lay one fin over the body of the fish, then use cocktail sticks to secure the other fin, the mouth and tail.
6. Roll out the white and black fondant on a surface dusted with icing sugar and cut out rounds to create the eye with a small white highlight. Stick this to the top of the cake, where you’ve left the exposed plain buttercream for the face.