And let there be cake!!

My good buddy, Wayne Andrews, is turning 75 years young this week...some of his airplane buddies and his wonderful kids planned a surprise birthday celebration this Saturday at the airport. His kids arranged for BBQ to feed 120. And there had to be cake, of course.....so I volunteered. And it had to be a BIG cake! Here is the pan I used - next to a standard 8" cake pan.

In order to get the batter to cook evenly throughout such a wide cake, you need to put metal "nails" in the batter to spread the heat evenly.  (These nails are actually made to make "roses" out of icing)

This is a finished layer with the "nails" protruding...perfectly done throughout.

Now to ice the cake.  Much buttercreme frosting was made!!

I mean, A LOT of buttercreme!

I got a "starter" coating of icing on at home.  There an additional layer you'll see next. 

Then, it was off to the airport to finish the decorating.

Here I am assembling the cake - the upper layer is going to be a runway.  I used black creme food coloring to get the pavement coloring.

And there it is!  The plane is the closest I could find to Wayne's Sonex that he built himself a few years ago.

Now, on to the surprise! His wife and kids did a great job of getting him to the airport without him figuring it out! Many, many handshakes and hugs were doled out!

Here is the cake and some gifts. 

His son presenting artwork of Wayne's racing days. 

Then BBQ was consumed!

Here is a closeup of the artwork.  I didn't know Wayne in the 70's, but he was obviously a fixture on the race circuit then!

Wayne being silly with some of the equally silly gifts he was given!

And this exactly the postscript any baker likes to see!!!