Adventures in Easter Lamb Cake

Nannie used to make an Easter cake with a lamb mold every year. It was one of the fun things about going to Nannies on Easter. I had talked about it with friends before and about trying to make one, and this past Christmas I got a lamb mold as a gift and decided on this Saturday to give it a try. 

Lamb cake mold - Christmas gift

I've never seen Nannie make her cake, it was always done & on the table before we arrived. I did some internet research and thought this should go smoothly. A friend of my recently remarked that I'm such an optimist because I expect things to go smoothly. 

BUT there was nothing, nothing smooth about this cake! I decided to go with the recipe that came with the mold from Kitchen Supply.

I greased & floured the pan

Filled the front ½ with batter, added toothpicks to the head & neck and tied it together

Halfway thru I decided to check on it and the batter was just oozing out all over the place! I transferred it to another cookie sheet and continued baking

and it continued to ooze out :-/

I let it cool and managed to get it out of the pan without major damage, but since the batter oozed out, it didn't rise up and fill the back half of the mold like it was supposed to. I have one emaciated lamb here.

I decided to frost it the next day, and overnight the ear and some of the head decided to separate. I pinned the ear back in place with several more toothpicks

A friend invited me to Easter Brunch so I went to that before I finished the cake. I didn't have enough time to make icing, so I bought some from the grocery store. When I got home my house was very warm and the icing kept acting like it was going to slide off as I was trying to put it on.

I don't think it looks too bad, I mustered up all the artistic ability I had to try to mold the icing into something that looked like fleece. Nannie put coconut on hers to simulate fleece, but I didn't do that here due to lack of coconut interest.

Then another realization hit me… how the hell was I going to get this to my friends house, over 45 min drive, for dinner without ruining it? 

This is what I came up with.

Here is a photo of Nannies Easter Lamb cake. 

Not horrific for my 1st try. The cake was a little dry so I'll have to try a different recipe, and try to tie the halves together tighter to keep the batter in next time.

If anyone reading this has made lamb cake, I'd like to hear your advice, success stories, or not so success stories.  Happy Easter!