Bloody Brain Cake Tutorial

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It is officially almost Halloween! Ugh, I can't wait! This bloody brain cake tutorial is super fun and perfect for Halloween with a very fun surprise when you cut into it. It will both please and gross out anyone and everyone and although it takes some time to make, it is easy to do. Maybe a little messy as well. but isn't that what Halloween is about? To have some fun and do some tricks if you don't get any treats?

And there you have a lovely gory, bloody brain cake tutorial. Perfect for Halloween or even just because!

Have fun with it!

Let's be honest. Making a cake is no feat but the edible blood is super easy to make and fool proof. If you aren't one for carving cakes than make some cupcakes instead and fill it with edible blood. Use it as a filling in a cake and make it ooze out for a vampire theme party.

Change it up!

The edible blood calls for strawberries to give it a better flavor. But if you would rather use a different fruit than by all means, give it a try! I suggest cherries or raspberries. But be careful since the ratios may be different as well as the water content in the fruit. The water content can make the edible blood more runny and not as thick as the original recipe.

Products I recommend

Above are some products that I personally use and recommend for this recipe and to have for everyday use. My absolute favorite is the BlueQ oven mitts. I have a collection of them and I love them! They are great quality and it’s nice to have a kitchen item with a sense of humor.

bloody brain cake

tutorial on making this gory brain cake covered in edible blood

• 4 layers red velvet cake
• 1 batch buttercream
• 1 batch edible blood
• 1 bag white candy melts

1. The very first step is to make the cake! And you can make any kind of cake you want, but the requested, and I highly suggest, was red velvet. The red velvet adds the "bloody" aspect to the cake. I used this recipe from Hummingbird High and I doubled the recipe. I used a large, square cake pan for this cake, and made 6 layers but only ended up using 5 of the layers and put the extra in the freezer for something else.
2. Once the cake is baked and ready to go, fill and stack the cakes with a plain vanilla frosting. I also did a crumb coat then placed the cake in the fridge for about 30 minutes until the cake is cold to make it easier to carve.
3. Carving the cake was interesting. I was trying to figure out how to make the shape of a brain and concluded to base is off the shape of a football. I carved the cake on the diagonal of the square shape and rounded it until I was happy with the look.
4. Using a paring knife, I carved out a decent sized round at the top of the cake. Carefully remove the piece that you carved and set it on a piece of wax paper or a plate.
5. Melt white candy melts and using a small off-set spatula, carefully coat the inside of the cake that was carved out to create a shell. Once the candy has set, do a second coat. The piece of cake that was removed, carefully remove a layer or two of the cake and do a coat of the candy melts on there as well.
6. Now the fun part is making the surprise that goes into the part that you just carved out in the cake! Blood! Now this is an edible blood and it's quite an interesting mixture of ingredients that actually worked out really well to make this blood (recipe at end of post).Fill the cake with as much blood as you can or want and once you have it filled, but make sure to leave a little bit leftover, take the piece of cake that you took out and coated with the candy melts and carefully insert back into the cake. I melted more candy melts and did a little coating along the edges of the re-inserted cake piece to prevent some blood back splash.
7. Once the chocolate has hardened to a quick crumb coat on the whole cake, make an indentation line across the center of the cake and then put into the fridge to let harden and set.
8. With a piping bag fitted with a large, round tip and filled with a nude/peach colored frosting, start piping zigzag like designs on one half of the cake and then continue onto the other half. The center line is there to help create that brain look and keep the piping in line.
9. With the leftover blood that you have, use a spoon and drop the blood onto the cake to give it the bloody look.

Edible Blood

edible blood flavored with strawberries and cocoa

• 1/2 cup light corn syrup
• 1 1/2 tbsp cocoa powder
• 2 1/2 tbsp cornstarch
• 3 small strawberries
• 1 tbsp milk
• Red food coloring

1. Blend the strawberries and milk into a food processor or blender.
2. In a bowl, combine the light corn syrup, cocoa powder, cornstarch, and strawberry mixture. Once combined add in the red food coloring until just the right coloring of blood.

NOTE: i suggest using a hot knife to cut into this cake. the chocolate can be hard to cut through so a hot knife will help. just boil some water, stick the knife in and wipe with a towel.