Thursday 7 March 2019

Mermaid and Llama decorating kits from Dr. Oetker - Review!

Mermaids and Llamas are cool say my girls and luckily Dr. Oetker has launched 2 six piece decorating kits to help us make some mermaid cupcakes and Llama & cacti biscuits.


We were send these kits to try and the girls were very excited. Ellie loves mermaids and Becky loves llamas!

I will admit, when it came to making the mermaid cakes I cheated and used ready made cupcakes. I wanted them to be perfect and mine sometimes don't rise or rise too much. 

Mermaid Cupcakes.

The pack contains everything you need to create 6 mermaid tail cupcake toppers and decorate up to 12 cupcakes.
- Fondant icing for moulding into tail shapes
- 2 Food Colour Gels for a blue/purple mermaid style
- Gold writing icing to create shimmery detailing
- Ocean inspired sprinkle sachets

Firstly you need to have your cupcakes ready.

You make your mermaid tails using the fondant icing. You colour half with the blue colour gels and the other half with the purple. You can use the template which is inside the box which really helps. 

Divide each coloured fondant ball into 3 pieces (3 x blue, 3 x violet). Roll out each coloured fondant to a thickness of approx. 1cm (approx. a pencil width). Then place the template on top of the icing and cut around the tail using a knife. It is advised to leave them to set for a few hours. You then insert a cocktail stick into the base of the tail to help it stand in the buttercream. 

To make the icing you make your buttercream icing and divide it equally between two bowls. You add 1 teaspoon of Blue Colour Gel to one bowl of icing and half a teaspoon of the violet colour gel to the other bowl of icing and mix.


Fit a piping bag with a 1cm star nozzle. Using a spatula spread the blue buttercream up one side of the bag so it fills half the piping bag. Repeat for the violet buttercream filling the other half of the piping bag. Then put the icing on your cakes then decorate with the sprinkles and finally adding the tails.


In theory this kit is such a good idea but the kids wanted to be involved and they didn't exactly go to plan.

Obviously you need cupcakes but there is a couple other things you need too like the piping bag. That isn't something I would always have in but I did this time and we did not have any cocktail sticks so just had to balance the tails.

I don't think they were too bad for a first try. I will be buying the kit again myself and trying it alone without the distraction and help from the kids.

Llama & Cacti Biscuits.

This kit contains all the decorations you'll need to create some wonderful llama and cactus biscuits. 
- Templates to cut out your biscuits. 
- Fondant Icing
- Food Colour Gel
- Writing Icings x2
- Sprinkles Sachets x3

There are templates in the inside of the box to cut out and you use these on your biscuit mix when it rolled out. I usually hate these cardboard templates but these actually worked pretty well and the biscuits looked like what they were supposed to be, llamas and cacti!


The biscuits turned out so well. I am not usually great at making cookies or biscuits (I blame my oven) but this time I sat in front of it watching so they didn't burn. hehehe

You then take the fondant and take some and use the green colouring gel to make it green for the cacti and keep the rest white for the llamas. You are supposed to roll it out and cut it using the templates but ours just wasn't rolling. It was too sticky despite using more icing sugar. We would go between too sticky then too dry. In the end we gave up and just took bits and pushed it on. To make the icing stick to the biscuits you need to use honey like a glue. We had none so we used Golden Syrup which is similar, right?!

You can then decorate them using the writing icing and sprinkles. 


I loved making these biscuits until it came to rolling the icing. I am guessing it had been in the kitchen where it was too warm. I think they look like llama's and cacti!

These kits are available to buy from most supermarkets and places you expect to find baking kits for £4.00 each. 

They are something a little different from the baking kits you usually get with the cake/biscuit mix, icing and a topper. I like them even though they are a bit of a faff on. I think if you have the time, patience and two kids not trying to help you could come up with some amazing creations.

As well as these two kits we were also sent a whole heap of Dr. Oetker decorating goodies which we are very excited to use and will be very soon. I already have unicorn cupcake cases which will go so well with the wafer unicorns.


I am a big fan of the Dr. Oetker products and use them all the time, the colouring gels especially. 

You can see how we got on with the decorating in the video below. We are not an Insta/Pinterest perfect family. We try our best but most of the times things don't work out perfectly. We always have fun giving them a go though.



We were sent these products free of charge in exchange for this blog post.

9 comments :

  1. These do look fun. My three would love to make them. Seems straightforward and easy to get good results. Different ovens make a huge difference. Premade cup cakes sound a good idea. #mmbc

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  2. a great idea with the older kids, as you say a faff to make but they look great
    Fifi loves cacti, I will need to have a look for these for her. Does this biscuit mix come in the box as well or do you make your own?

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    1. No, you have to get your own ingredients for the biscuits x

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  3. I REALLY need the mermaid ones!! hahah x

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  4. These are a fab activity to do with the kids. I think getting the pre-made cupcakes is genius and a massive time saver. x

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  5. What colourful creations. My girls love to cook and I'm trying to encourage language like 'stir' through it. #MMBC

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  6. These are a great idea... I'm not sure I could make them look anything like what they're supposed to look like with Erin though

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  7. These are so cute!! Loving the mermaid cupcakes! #MMBC

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  8. My oldest would love these! Such fun! #MMBC

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