A great family activity to welcome a new baby is to make a cake together and celebrate his or her arrival. Top your cake with this cute little baby-or several babies. This is also a great gift to bring new parents in the hospital. Marzipan is a delicious treat!
To make a marzipan baby, you will need:
Marzipan
Food coloring:
–black for pupils
–select color for baby’s clothes
–select color for baby’s skin
Gum paste for eyes, if desired
Waxed paper
Tape waxed paper to your work surface to make cleanup easier.
Knead marzipan until it is flexible. Add food coloring. In this example, we will use blue. To form the body of the baby, create a blue 3-D teardrop shape. Allow the teardrop to rest on the waxed paper. At the wide part of the teardrop, lift the marzipan toward the sky. This will be the torso of the baby. The point will be the tip of the baby’s blanket.
With blue marzipan, roll out two cylinders. Attach to the side of the torso of the baby to form arms.
Next, make the hands of the baby by rolling out several balls of dough. Use a medium sized, flattened ball for the hand, and five small balls for the fingers. Make the thumb slightly larger. Attach to the bottom of the arms.
For the baby’s head, roll out a medium sized ball and place on top of the torso.
Using the color the baby has for clothing, make the pacifier by rolling out a small ball of dough, then flattening it. Place at baby’s mouth. Then, roll out another small ball of marzipan and attach to the flat piece of the pacifier in the center.
To make a nose, roll out a small ball of dough and attach above the pacifier. The cartoon baby does not need a nose…if you wish to omit it, skip this step.
For they eyes, you have several options. One option is to skip having a white-part to the eyes and just add two small, flat, black circular pieces of dough above the pacifier.
Another option is to use marzipan for the white part of the eyes. Attach two flat, circular pieces of marzipan above the nose. Then, attach two flat, circular pieces of black marzipan on top of the others as pupils.
Keep in mind that marzipan is a light almond color, and not a true white. If you wish to use something to make they eyes lighter, try gum paste for the eyes instead of marzipan. If you use gum paste for the eyes, remove them before eating the figurine. Gum paste looks much better than it tastes.
With your hands, roll out a medium sized ball of dough to form the beginning of the baby’s hat. Flatten the dough and place on top of the baby’s head.
To form a tassel, roll out a small ball of dough and add on top of the hat.
Once your baby is complete, add to the top of the cake. Or, make several marzipan babies to put in a gift box and bring as a treat to the expectant parents. Marzipan tastes wonderful, and makes a wonderful gift from kids!
