I am so excited to share this Moana Birthday Cake with you today! It is a blast to make and the perfect birthday cake for any Moana fan.
We recently celebrated our sweet girl’s 8th birthday. I started making her birthday cake when she turned one and it’s become a fun family tradition. I absolutely love it!
This year, our daughter is all about Moana, so a Moana Birthday Cake was a must for birthday #8!
There are so many things I love about Moana; she’s strong and brave, she shows us that it’s important to never give up. Moana is smart and resourceful and she believes in herself. That’s the kind of role model I like to see for little girls these day:)
This post contains affiliate links meaning at no additional cost to you I may get a percentage of the sale if you buy through these links. Thanks for your support!
With Moana on my mind, my daughter and I set out for some inspiration. After searching and searching, we found the perfect cake here. I just love the look of this cake with it’s cascading waterfall and Moana characters perched up on the top – it was just what I was looking for.
I am happy to report that this cake is actually simple to put together and a design anyone can tackle, no matter how much cake decorating experience you have.
Here’s what you’ll need to make this Moana Birthday Cake:
- 1 – 8″ round cake pan
- 1 – 6″ round cake pan
23 boxes of cake mix (updated: 1 box for 2-8″ rounds & 2 boxes for 4-6″ rounds — you will use 3 of the 6″ rounds and freeze the 4th)- 5 cups of buttercream
- Blue and green icing color
- Grass icing tip
- 3 cans of pirouline cookies
- Brown sugar
- Accent flowers
- Set of Moana characters (I used these)
UPDATE (8/9/17) I’ve received so much wonderful feedback on this cake (thank you), and I wanted to take a minute and add an update that address a question that have been emailed to me on a few occassions.
One of the biggest questions asked was about the number of layers in the cake. There are actually 2 – 8″ round cake layers on the bottom and 3 – 6″ round cake layers for the top . You will use 1 box of cake mix to make the 2-8″ cake rounds & then the other 2 boxes will make 4-6″ cake rounds. You will only use 3 of the 4 – 6″ rounds for this Moana cake. Just freeze that un-used 4th cake layer to use another day! If you are making a third layer for the top tier, slide some dowels rods (aff link) through the top of cake for support. I also use cardboard cake rounds on the bottom of each cake tier. I hope this helps. Please feel free to keep the emails coming…I love hearing from you:)
And here’s the best part about this cake…you do not have to be a master cake decorator. The icing doesn’t need to be perfect because you’re going to cover it all up with those tasty pirouline cookies. I mean look at the rough job on this icing…
Using pirouline cookies around the perimeter of the cake is the perfect way to hide any imperfections and gives your Moana Birthday Cake the perfect festive Moana feel.
If you look closely at the top of the 8″ cake, you’ll see that I added some “sand” (brown sugar) to hide the top of the blue icing. The original cake design has accent flowers made out of gum paste or maybe fondant. To save time, I used some paper flowers I already had on hand! They worked perfectly!
The waterfall was my sister’s handy work! She built up the icing and then used the flat part of a spatula to create the water effect. To give the water some color dimension, just add a few drops of darker blue coloring in random spots on the waterfall and use your spatula to blend the color.
To finish things off, I sprinkled some more “sand” (brown sugar) on top of the cake and then placed this Moana Figurine Set on top of the sand. It was the perfect topper for this Moana Birthday Cake and even gives the birthday girl something to play with when the party is all over!
No matter your cake-making skill level, definitely give this Moana cake a try. You can bake the cake from scratch or use box mix – either will work. And remember, you don’t have to be meticulous about your icing work because those pirouline cookies certainly cover the majority of your icing.
This Moana Birthday Cake will certainly put a HUGE smile on your birthday girl’s face!
Pin It For Later…
I saw a picture of this cake online and thought: “amazing, yet very simple!” Thank you so much!!
THANK YOU!! I have love making my daughter’s birthday cakes every year and hope to post the others soon so be sure to check back!
For the Moana waterfall cake. I am making it from a box mix but the cakes are quiet not as tall do I need to make more round cakes ?
Thanks for reaching out! You can certainly take a 3rd box mix and make additional cakes for height. I would suggest making additional 6″ rounds for the top layer. Just remember to insert some dowels in the center to help with stability. Stay in touch and let me know how it turns out:)
Thank you – it looks amazing.
Fingers crossed I’ll get this one done as beautiful looking as yours
Yay! I am very excited to hear how it goes. You’ll do great. I’d love to see a picture once you’ve finished! Happy birthday to your little one:)
Hello, love the Moana cake and hoping to make it for my 4year old’ birthday in a couple of weeks. I read through and you have a link to the perfect cake but it takes me to a French site that has a video. I can tell that it’s pretty detailed and has a step by step which would be very helpful. Is there an English version? Please help! Much appreciated
Hi. I honestly just put the cake together based on the photo. I do know that Google Chrome has a Translate feature. All you need to do is open the site in Chrome and look in the address bar at the top of the screen. There will be a tiny icon that appears on the far right side. Hover over that icon and it should say “translate”. Click that icon and the page should translate into English. Hope this helps! Thanks.
Thank you for the great tutorial. I hope to make this soon for my granddaughter’s 4th birthday. I have a question about the Maui figure. Is he pushed down inside the top cake or is he standing on top of the bottom cake? I would love to see a photo of the back of the cake and a photo from the top, looking down at the cake! Thank you very much!
Hi Janet! Maui is standing on top of the top layer of cake. I did push the base of his figure into the cake a bit. If you find that he is still falling over simply push 2 toothpicks right up against the back of his body to provide some support! Hope this helps!! Thanks for stopping by!
What buttercream recipe did you use?
How early did you assemble the cake? Do the pirouette things get soggy? My daughter’s party is tomorrow and I didn’t want to wait until the last minute to put it together. Thank you so much for such a beautiful cake.
Hi Julie! Happy birthday to your daughter:) I made my daughter’s cake the night before her party which was in the afternoon. I just set it in the fridge. The pirouettes didn’t get soggy. I just brought the cake out on the counter a few hours before the party so that the cake wasn’t cold when it was served. Thanks for reaching out! Have a great weekend:)
Thank you so much. I am not confident in the kitchen at all and am so proud of this cake I had made for my daughters 1st birthday- she is Moana obsessed!
Your instructions were so easy and clear to follow!
I am so excited to hear from you about making this cake for your daughter’s 1st birthday! I’m glad you found the instructions easy to follow and I hope you visit ezeBreezy again. Have a great day!
Khrista,
Did you use dowel rods for this cake? I know you mentioned if you make this a three layer cake to use the dowel rods. I am making my grand daughters birthday cake on for her party on Sat .
I am so sorry…I am not sure how I missed your question. Yes, I did use dowel rods on the cake. I hope your cake turned out amazing!
I am making this cake for my granddaughter’s 2nd birthday. I’m not usually this daring but your instructions seem so clear I think I can do it. I only have 9″ baking pans and 6″ pans. Should I use 3 boxes of mix for the 9″ and make 3? Also, you said you put cardboard rounds between the layers. Do you mean between the bottom layers and the 6″ layers? If so, how do the dowels go in? They don’t need to connect to the 9″ layers? Sorry to be so needy but I really want this to come out right! Thank you so much!
Hi Pat. Your granddaughter will love this cake! I promise you it is much easier to make than you think. 1 box of cake mix will be enough for the 2 – 9-inch cake pans. You should only need to put dowel rods into the bottom tier of the cake. The bottom tier needs to support the weight of the top tier. Here is a very helpful video what will walk you through the steps. https://youtu.be/nw-LYEAm9vE You can put a core rod through the center of both tiers if you’d like. Some cake boards already have a perforated hole in the center of the board which makes this easy. I hope this helps and answers your questions!
I hot glued two play cookies to Maui’s feet to give him a flat surface to stand on. It worked perfectly and they just peeled off of him when we were done. I used the “sand” to cover them.