What Would Happen If You Gave a YoYo to a Flock of Flamingos?

Disney Classic # 38 - Fantasia 2000

I played with a few ideas for Fantasia 2000, all of them working along the same line... Fantasia 2000 was part-sequel part-re-imagining of Fantasia, so what ever I did for the cake had to be a bigger, better, new and improved version of the popping candy cupcakes I'd made for Fantasia. For Fantasia I aimed to make something that - on top of being tasty -was colourful, noisy, and had a bit of sparkle, and I think I achieved that with the rainbow sprinkles inside the cake, the popping candy centre and the edible glitter. But this time I wanted more - and so we ended up with a rainbow sponge cake, popping candy layers, edible glitter and SPARKLERS!!

I chuffing loved the sparklers - not the greatest photo I know!

I sort of made this up as I went along using my basic vanilla sponge recipe. For the icing I thought I'd try something new and so used a recipe I found here, but to be honest I don't think I'd use it again. It was easy to spread and set nicely, but it was far too runny for piping and had a coconut-y taste that I wasn't too keen on. But hey ho, that's how it goes!

Prep time: 1-2 hours            Cook time: 20 mins per layer (2 hours)         Serves: 10-12

Ingredients:
200g ready to roll white icing (or 200g of pre-coloured icings in colours of your choice)
Various food dyes (red, yellow and blue at a minimum!)
300g margarine
300g caster sugar
3 medium eggs
300g self raising flour
4 tsps vanilla extract
200g shortening (if you can't get any shortening, I used a dairy-free vegetable spread ;-) )
1kg icing sugar
120ml water
pinch of salt
1tsp almond extract
5 packets of popping candy
2tbsps strawberry jam
Edible glitter
multi-coloured sugar balls

1. Colour the ready to roll icing and cut out shapes to decorate the top and sides of the cake with (this can be done a few days in advance to save time)
2. Preheat the oven to gas mark 6 and line a cake tin
3. Beat together the margarine and the caster sugar until creamy, then beat in one of the eggs. Sift some of the flour into the bowl and stir into the mixture. Repeat until all of the eggs and flour have been incorporated to make a smooth mixture.
4. Add two tsps of vanilla extract and mix well.
5. Divide the mixture equally between 6 bowls and use food dye to colour the mixtures red, orange, yellow, blue, green and purple.
6. Bake each layer for 20 minutes or until the sponge springs back when pressed. Turn out and leave to cool on a wire rack.
7. Whilst the layers are cooling, prepare the frosting. Tip the shortening, water, 2 tsps vanilla extract and 1 tsp almond extract into a large bowl with roughly half of the icing sugar. Beat with an electric mixer for 10 minutes, then beat in the remaining icing sugar.
8. Once the cakes have cooled, begin to stack them, placing a thin spread of strawberry jam and a packet of popping candy between each layer.
9. Once the cakes are stacked, ice the cake. Stick the pre-made decorations onto the sides ad top of the cake, and sprinkle edible glitter over the whole thing. To finish, crate a border around the bottom of the cake using the sugar balls.
10. Cut into slices and enjoy!

It might be a while until you hear from me again, as this is/was the last movie/cake before I had to take a break to go into hospital for my operation, and I've decided to give myself April off for recovery and hope to pick this up again in May! Whenever the next Disney Night ends up being, we will be watching The Emperor's New Groove and I'll be making something a little bit Inca! Until then...

Happy Thoughts
x