Simple Dora Cake

• Cake decorating accessories manufacturer Wilton makes a licensed Dora the Explorer-shaped cake pan, which you can find anywhere cake decorating supplies are sold. Grease and flour the pan well, so the cake does not stick, then use this pan to turn your favorite cake recipe into a Dora-shaped cake. Mix your favorite frosting recipe with appropriate gel food colors to create Dora's dark hair, tan skin, purple top and red pants. Use an offset frosting spatula to smooth the frosting onto the cake evenly.
  
  

Dora's Face

• Bake a half-sheet cake using any cake recipe you like, then allow it to cool completely. Use Nick Jr.'s Dora face cake template to guide you as you cut Dora's head out of the cake with a serrated knife. Frost the cake like you would with the simple Dora cake, but without purple frosting. For a more hair-like texture to the decorations for Dora's hair, press black licorice strings into place. If your child prefers chocolate, take Nick Jr.'s suggestion of using melted chocolate chips piped from a plastic bag to create Dora's hair, including her cowlick.
  
  

Dora's Adventure

• Bake a cake in any shape you like, using any pan you have on hand. Use fondant to create 3-D versions of Dora, Boots, Backpack and Map; if you used modeling clay as a child, you know how to work with fondant. Mix gel food colors into pieces of fondant to make them the right shade for the different parts of the characters. Avoid liquid food color, as it destroys the texture of fondant. After you mold the characters, decorate the cake according to their adventure. Perhaps they're climbing a mountain, or visiting a forest. Maybe they're at the zoo, and you need to mold lots of zoo animals. Let your child's imagination and yours take Dora on a cake adventure.
  
  

Dora's Fiesta

• Instead of just serving the cake at a party, let the cake have a party of its own. Dora has a lot of friends she can invite, including Swiper, Tico, and Benny. Mold all these characters out of fondant, as with the Dora's Adventure cake. Don't forget to add the Fiesta Trio, or Dora won't have any music at her party. Give yourself plenty of time before your child's party, since this cake will probably take a couple of hours to decorate.