When you are going to carve a cake you need to start with a good solid cake, it is no good trying to carve a cake that is too crumbly or has knobby bits like a fruit cake. I use a madeira recipe and it works very well.
I’ve learnt with carving you have to be careful not to get carried away. It’s very easy to think i’ll just take a bit more and then realise you’ve gone too far, so carve a little at a time and keep stepping back and assessing your shape before continuing. It’s easier to go back and carve a little more than it is to re-build a cake that has gone too far.
Right! Let’s go.
Step 1.
I started with a 12 inch round madeira cake, baked, cooled and wrapped overnight to allow the cake to settle. 
Step 2.
Use an edible pen to roughly sketch out the shape of the car and using a small sharp knife cut into your line with the tip pointing straight down to cut out the shape. Cut with confidence once you are happy with your drawn shape. I used lots of research images to help get the shape right here.
Tip* Use a small sharp kitchen knife to carve details and smaller shapes. Use a large, flat knife if you are carving sweeping shapes like wonky cakes etc.
Once you have the basic shape tilt the knife so you are using the edge and begin carving away in thin slices at the blunt edges of your shape. You are looking for a rounded finish so gently work away at the edges to get a softer, more finished shape.
Carve the back of the car shape so it slopes down to the point at the back.
Take a piece of your cut away cake and cut and shape a nose piece and add it back to your design. This will be secured with buttercream later.
Cut away a small hole for the beginnings of the car seat in line with the front of the wings.
Step 3
Look at your pieces of cut-away cake. You are looking for a curved edge from any of the cake sides.
Use the natural curve to your advantage. Straighten off the none curved side of the piece.
This bit is hard to describe so i’d suggest looking at the pictures below to help with my descriptions.
Place the flat edge on top of the car base with one edge at the back to your car base. You are looking to create the sloping roof of the car, leading from back of the car to the seat area you have already begun creating. Mark with your pen where the ‘roof’ piece meets the end of the wings of the car, at the point where the nose begins.
Remove the piece to your mat and cut straight down where your edible pen mark is to create your roof shape. Carve the edges again to soften down and round the shape off. I did a little carving of the slope to create a more realistic roof shape. See images below for an idea of the finished shape.
Side view of roof piece added to base pieces.
Step 4
Work the details into the cake.
Gently carve your roof piece to create the back of the seat area.
Work into the roof piece to create the narrow ridge shape at the top of the roof.
Add ‘indents’ to the front of the wings to create the grills.
You can use a clean paintbrush to help brush crumbs away from your design.
Step 5
Leave to settle for a couple of hours and then go back and check you are happy with the shape.
Step 6
Using the remaining large areas of cut away cake make your wheels using a circle cutter as a guide. Gently aper the wheels so they are wider at one side (the outer edge) than the other edge. (The inner edge.)
The whole carved cake should now look something like this!
Step 7
Crumb coat your whole design in buttercream, work gently into the indents you have created and secure the nose in place with more buttercream. I did not coat the wheels as I thought it would create a real mess when trying to cover them in sugarpaste. I just advised the client they were for decoration only. You can crumb coat them if you want though.
Step 8
Colour up, roll out and cover your whole car in fondant. Work into the indents and cut away the excess as usual.
Step 9
You have your covered basic car shape carved, crumb coated and covered. You can now finish off your fondant and add your details.
Details:
I covered the wheels in black fondant and used a wheel tool to create the grooves.
I added the seat and filled the indents using black fondant and the ball tool.
I used dowels and cocktail sticks also covered in black fondant to create the axles.
I created the spoiler using coloured flowerpaste and sticking the individual pieces together with royal icing once it had dried 24hrs later. I then fastened the spoiler to the car using more royal icing, attaching it to the inside of the back wheels.
Final details were added in fondant and writing hand piped and drawn in edible pen.
I hope this quick tutorial gives you all the confidence to have a go at cake carving! <3
Oh my! This is amazing! I love cakes, McLaren and Formula 1 so all three together, for me, is amazing! I am going to have to attempt this one day