Beautiful birthday cakes which bypass the artificial-colours

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LIVVY TURNS 6: Many people have emailed me over the past year asking how to cope with birthdays when their children have reactions for artificial food colouring. These are the times of the year when children really want and expect a brightly coloured, deliciously tasting cake – and it is easy to think that it is all too hard when your child has food allergies.

Olivia, the original Hullabaloo Kid, turned 6 this week and I thought that I would share with you some of the tricks I use to make her birthday cakes look just as exciting as other girls’. The basic rule to remember is “They only have to see the colour, they don’t have to eat it.”

I searched the net for a picture of a butterfly which had nice clean lines and a very girly colour. I printed it out in full colour and laminated it to my standard cake board with clear contact. This kept it steady and clean. I then made a very plain “Livvy friendly cake” which had even less ingredients than the Hullabaloo Food Magic Cake, trimmed the corners off the rectangle and covered with plain white icing.

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You can decorate cakes with anything – I ran out of time so wove pink ribbon around the candles and bent pipe cleaners for the antenna. The only suggestions is don’t use sweets thinking that you will be able to remove them before the cake is eaten. You will have tears.