Rainbow Unicorn Birthday Cake

I decided that a rainbow birthday party totally needed a layered rainbow cake. But I was pretty nervous because I had never made a six-layered cake before. So I just keep telling myself, “If I mess this up, it isn’t the end of the world if I have to buy cupcakes from the grocery store.” Making things yourself always requires a little bravery and willingness to mess things up royally. I always tell my kids that I usually make at least one big mistake on every project that I do, and that messing up is okay. So I crossed my fingers and got started on the most “rainbowy” Rainbow Unicorn birthday cake the world has ever seen.

Luckily, some tips from Martha Stewart made things a lot easier. For example, placing 4 strips of parchment paper around the edges of the cake and doing a crumb layer of frosting. Frosting a colored cake with white frosting is always tricky, even with a one-layered cake, so the crumb layer was a life saver.

I was pretty worried how it would look when I started stacking the layers because they weren’t all perfectly flat on top. It was hard to imagine this looking good.

But when I first cut into the Rainbow Unicorn birthday cake and heard all the girls gasp in surprise, it made all the baking jitters worth it. I was delighted to see that all the layers came together perfectly. It is wonderful what a little buttercream frosting can do!

Using the right food coloring also makes a big difference. I used to wonder how people got such vibrant colors, and then I heard about gel food coloring. For this cake, I used Americolor Soft Gel Paste. Using the food coloring you can buy at the grocery just won’t cut it if you want bright colors. And the gel paste lasts a long time because you don’t have to use much of it.

And as if the multiple layers weren’t enough, I decided to do M&M’s along the side to match the layers. This took a little longer than I thought it would, but it wasn’t too bad and it looked really cool.

I kept the top pretty simple with a cake banner I bought on Amazon and a unicorn I bought and spray painted silver.

The Rainbow Unicorn birthday cake was a little time consuming, but not too bad, and it didn’t require much skill. It is one of those cakes that looks amazing, even if you aren’t that amazing of a cake decorator.