Football Cake

This past weekend, my brother-in-law, turned 32 years old. He is a Gator football fanatic, so my sister asked me to make him a Florida Gator cake for his birthday. I decide to go to Joanne's and check out their cake supply section for inspiration. Wilton makes a cake pan called the First and Ten Football Cake. I found it at Joanne's, and it was perfect for his birthday. Also, the football cake pan can be used to make other things...like football-shaped bread, and as a mold for a giant rice crispy treat, so I knew it would get used a lot during football season.

His favorite cake is red velvet with cream cheese icing. I used a recipe I found in a book called The Cake Mix Doctor by Anne Byrn. She uses store-bought cake mixes as the base in all of her recipes to make delicious semi-homemade cakes. I dyed some of the icing orange and used it to frost the cake. Then, I dyed a smaller portion of the icing blue, and used that to decorate the cake.

The red velvet cake was so moist and delicious, and the cream cheese icing was creamy and sweet. It got rave reviews and was literally annihilated in about 10 minutes, leaving me wishing I had made two cakes because I don't think everyone got a piece.

Red Velvet Cake recipe:
1 box of German chocolate cake mix with pudding
1 cup sour cream
1/2 cup water
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 ounce Wilton red food coloring
3 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract

*Blend all ingredients and bake at 350 degrees until the sides of the cake just start to pull away from the pan. The time will vary depending on the size of your pan(s).

Cream Cheese Icing recipe:
8 ounces cream cheese (room temp)
1 stick butter (room temp)
3-3/4 cup powdered sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract

*Blend all ingredients and spread on cake