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Making a 3.5' octopus from cake takes less effort than you think, but does require the use of 2 cake boards to keep things together. If you make this fun cake for a birthday celebration, you can stick candles in your poor octopus, or make a smaller cake for candles on the side, the choice is yours. Here's what you'll need:

• Sheet Cake
• Rice Krispie Cereal
• Marshmallows + Butter
• Fruit Loops Cereal
• Nerds Candy
• Frosting
• 2 Cake Boards

Start with a baked and cooled sheet cake (which can be purchased pre-made if you're looking to make the process even easier). Cut in on the sides, like an hour glass, or shapely womanly figure (hubba hubba), like this:

The excess cake can be placed on top of the cake for eyes, or snacked on while you work--bonus!. Next, make Rice Krispie treats according to the package directions and mold them into tentacles and as facial bump outs (assuming you're like us and ate the previously mentioned extra cake).

Frost the entire thing in the color of your choice, we did blue, but purple, pink or even green could work out just fine! Now our frosting looks a little less than professional, when we made our cake earlier, it was nearing 100 degrees in our kitchen and we were doing good to keep things together, so you can leave it "rustic" as we have, or take a little more time at smoothing things down.

Next, add Fruit Loops and nerds to decorate your octopus, we love the look of the multicolor cereal as the suction cups on each tentacle and the burst of extra flavor (As well as color) that the nerds gave. You are welcome to use a candy or decoration of your choosing, just mosey around the cereal and candy aisles for a bit and see if anything strikes your fancy. Remember, gummy candies can be rolled out to create larger vibrant colored shapes as well (which was the route we almost went before settling on Fruit Loops).

That's all there is to it, you don't have to be a professional baker, or even experienced backer to create something fun, plus the frosted tentacles are just as tasty as the rest of the cake, and you can eat it with your hands!

(Images: Sarah Rae Trover)

Originally published 11.20.09 - JL