The Nacho Cheese Dispenser Cake

Tonight was nothing short of awesome. Not only did I get to make a kick-ass cake for my favorite radio show Too Beautiful To Live (TBTL) and go rollerskating for the first time since the fourth grade (SO much fun!), I got to talk about the cake on the radio too! (If you'd like to listen, my interview starts at 33 minutes into the podcast. They also gave me a great shout-out right after they saw the cake that you can hear at 20 minutes in. But really you should just listen to the entire show. Believe me, you'll LOVE it.)


So you're probably wondering what a nacho cheese dispenser cake has to do with a radio show. Well, it was a random comment that the host of the show, Luke Burbank, made that inspired me. He told a story a few weeks ago about his love affair with nacho cheese sauce at 7-11 as a kid and how he still loves it even now. When I heard him say that, I knew instantly I had to at least try to make it. After lots of research about nacho cheese dispensers, I decided it was possible. Once I got started with the cake, I couldn't just stop at making the dispenser. I also made a plate of chips covered in nacho cheese and I "cheesed" up the cake by making it orange and adding a few green sprinkles to the batter to replicate little flecks of jalapeño peppers.

The cake was a simple white cake (technically it was orange with little flecks of green to resemble nacho cheese sauce with jalapenos flakes) that was double-filled with a layer of delche de leche and vanilla bean butter cream. It took about 40 hours or so to make.

That included making:

•  one batch of Rice Krispy Treats (for the plunger body)
• 5 half-sheet vanilla cakes
• 20 cups of vanilla bean icing
• 7 cups of dulche de leche, 
• all sugar work:
• the spout (complete with a big drip of cheese)
• plunger top
• cheese on top of the nachos (gum pate and candy melts!)
• plate 
• TBTL banner
• words 
• on/off switch
• "on" light
• thermostat sign
• thermostat dial
• the four pounds of fondant work on the outside of the cake

The 40 hours didn't include the time spent on designing the cake, the research, the shopping, or the cleaning of the kitchen, or delivering the cake to the skating rink.

Sure, it was a lot of work, but it was so much fun to make! It was just something I wanted to do and I'm so glad I did. To the TBTL crew - Jen, Luke, Sean, Robin and everyone behind the scenes... I know this sounds a bit cheesy but thank you, thank you, thank you for all the hard work you put into the show and for making me and my family laugh each and every time we listen. Rawr!
I apologize for the lack of good pictures. I didn't have much time between the time the cake was due and when I finished it.