Rilakkuma (リラックマ) Double Chocolate Cake

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My nephew would turn 1 this month. I wanna to make a special cake for his very first birthday.

I chose Rilukkuma (リラックマ) as the theme. It is Japanese cartoon character. The name 'Rilukkuma' derives from Rilak (relax) + Kuma (bear) hence meaning bear in relaxing mood.

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For the cake, I went for chocolate cake with airy texture which would be a compliment to milk chocolate ganache. I used milk chocolate instead of my usual dark chocolate for the ganache to give light brown color to match the color of the bear. Also its sweeter and creamier taste should be more kid-friendly than dark chocolate ganache.

Then it's time to cover the cake. I decided to leave the texture unsmooth so that it looked like stuffed toy bear. At first I made a yellow circle from tinted white chocolate ganache at each of its ears but it was too runny. So I took it out and just left the ears plain brown. The white section at the nose was made from whipped cream. The eyes, nose and mouth was made from melted dark chocolate.

Now he's ready to wish the boy a very happy birthday!

Everyone especially the birthday boy's parents were so excited. Lol. They also enjoyed the double chocolate cake. Hope my nephew will be happy too when he grow up and see the picture of his first birthday.

I really love the vanilla moment a cake can bring to a special occasion :)

Great-grandfather was giving the boy a piece of cake.