Despicable Me Minion Cake Tutorial

Ohemgeee!!!!!!!   It has taken me more than THIRTEEN HOURS to edit the pictures and write this Despicable Me Minion Cake Tutorial!

Why you ask?    Because I.hate.change.

So I took a photography class on Saturday – my first real-life, in person class and I absolutely loved it!   However, at the recommendation of the teacher and my son (who had been telling me for months), I switched from Photoshop Elements to Adobe Creative Cloud over the weekend and the learning curve is killing me!

What normally would’ve taken me 2-3 hours (still a long time) took me all.day.long. because I couldn’t figure out how to do the normal things I do in Photoshop.

I know – am absolutely convinced – that CC is better and will be much easier once I get the hang of it, but yikes… today was a nightmare!

On top of that, I have a head-cold, three of my kids also have colds and we’re all cranky!  The runny noses and sinus headaches and itchy eyes and earaches…. #nightmare.

That’s all.  Just a nightmare.

Oh and did I mention that my husband is working 12 hour shifts right now – gone 14 hours a day – and I’m home trying to edit pictures in this demon-photo-editing-program with sick kids.  Bad combination ya’ll… bad combination!

Okay – enough whining.   Let’s get on with the tutorial, okay?

Here’s what you’ll need to make this Despicable Me Minion Cake:

• (3) 8″ round cakes plus (1) 6″ half ball cake, I used vanilla cake
• serrated knife for carving cake
• buttercream, for filling and frosting
• yellow, blue, black, white, gray and brown fondant (a combination of Satin Ice &  homemade marshmallow fondant)
• pizza wheel
• fondant smoothers
• Ribbon cutter
•  Xacto blade
• Sugar glue
• Stitching tool
• Cake ball dough
• 1″ and 2″ round cookie cutters
• Small round frosting tip (#3 or #4 would work well)
• Black Licorice Laces (can substitute fondant if you need to)
• Silver Sixlets
• Small round cutters

Step 1.  Bake the cakes.  As mentioned above, you’ll need (2) 8″ rounds plus a 6″ half ball cake for the body.  You could just bake (3) 8″ rounds, but I used foil and dry beans to make half a cake in one pan because I didn’t have enough batter to fill it and I *thought* I may need the extra cake for the body.  I didn’t.  But I did use it to make the cake ball dough for the legs & feet!

Step 2: Build the main body of the cake.  I take the 8″ rounds and fill them normally, then cut them down the middle.  I also take the half-ball cake and cut it in hall, then put filling between all of the layers to create the body.    Half round on top, followed by four layers of cake.  Then crumb coat the entire thing!

Step 3:  Cover the body of the Minion Cake with yellow fondant; cut off the excess around the edges and use fondant smoothers to get a smooth finish. Note: I use homemade marshmallow fondant for the yellow and white parts on this cake then Satin Ice for the black, blue and brown.

Step 4:  Use blue fondant to create the overalls.   I didn’t do step-by-step photos here, but I just pulled up a picture of a Minion online and then did my best to copy that design.  I used a ribbon cutter, xacto knife and then sugar glue to attach it.

Step 5:  Add the pocket on front and then use a stitching tool to add details around all the hems and seams.

Step 6:  Now it’s time to add the feet and legs.  I used the leftover cake from the half ball and the extra half a cake to make cake ball dough to do these.   You can see my tutorial here for making cake balls  – that’s the dough I used.  I laid them out side by side to be sure I had them symmetrical.

Step 7:  Cover the legs in blue fondant, then the feet in black fondant.  I added a sole to the shoes, then painted them with water to make them shiny (just don’t touch them until they dry!).

Step 8:  Add black bands around the side of the head.  I used Satin Ice black fondant, my ribbon cutter and an impression mat (you could skip that).

Step 9:  For the eyes, use a 2″ round cookie cutter to cut out some thick white circles, then cut out gray strips with my ribbon cutter to wrap them in.   Assemble it all with sugar glue.

Step 10:  Put the eyes on with the seams in the center, then you cover them with a little bridge.  Also cut a moon-shaped sliver for the mouth out of black fondant and attach it with a tiny dot of sugar glue.

Step 11:  Cut out 1″ circles, then use a round frosting tip to make impressions in it for the buttons on the overalls and also attach those with sugar glue.

Step 12:  The rest of these pictures are where I added all of the details to finish him up.   First, I used Black Licorice Laces for the hair but you could also use tiny rolls of black fondant.    With this candy, I cut it into pieces maybe 2″ long, then pushed it into the top of the cake.

You can see the hair in the picture below, along with a few other details.  I used black and brown to add pupils with smaller round cutters and I used Silver Sixlets to add the rivets around the edges of his glasses (are they glasses? goggles?).

I also hand-cut the little logo on his front pocket – I didn’t get it super clean but that little buger was hard!

Oh, oh, oh!!  And I almost forgot… the arms and hands!!!!!!!!!!  That would’ve been terrible, huh?  They were both solid fondant.  I rolled out long ropes for the arms then cut & glued them to the sides.  For the hands, I shaped the balls of fondant, flattened them, the cut and pulled apart for the thumb.  Then I added a little band around the seam between the arm & hand.

And that’s it!!   Not counting the baking, I was able to decorate him in 3 hours or less.   The most tedious part was the little logo!!

Do you have any questions about this Despicable Me Minion Cake Tutorial?  Leave me a comment and I’ll answer if I can!

PS.  Have you entered the Who Takes the Cake Contest?  If not – hop over and enter your cake for a chance to win a $50 gift card!

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