The Icing On The Cake

The Icing On The Cake

I'm a self taught cake decorator. 

When I accidentally started my cake business*, it was all trial and error. I made some doozies of mistakes and so when someone approaches me to talk about their kitchen fails I can relate more then you know. In fact, growing up, I was pretty terrible in the kitchen. My parents coined the term "Shannon Flop's" for the failed baking that I achieved. Oh don't be sad for me, my therapist says I'm making great progress in this area. **

So in the spirit of helping a sister (or brother) out, I thought I would post some of the tips I use to ice "perfect" cake. 

Firstly, just like a house (and your face 2am on a Saturday night), if you don't build a good foundation, everything starts to crumble. 

1. The Perfect Buttercream Icing

• 500gms of soft icing sugar
• 500gms butter at room temperature (not marg or not softened butter, if it doesn't set in the fridge, your cake wont set) 
• A splash of thickened or whipping cream (a tablespoon or 2)
• Flavouring/ essence
• Food colouring

1) Whip the butter using the whipping tool on your mix master until its all fluffy and add the cream. 

2) Add the icing sugar one cup at a time until it is all all mixed though. It should be fluffy and creamy and have the type of consistency that makes you want to bury your head in it. 

3) Add your colours and flavours. Gel colouring is the best because you use less and reduce the risk of watering down the icing and changing the consistency.

2. Cutting the cake

A flat surface is important. I picked up an adjustable wire cake slicer from Wheel and Barrow for about $6. I use it to slice off the curved part of the cake, slice the cake into layers and quite often I will flip the cake over to use the bottom of the cake as the top. You want the top of your cake as flat as as the Fresh prince's hair cut. 

3. Icing the cake 

I always use a piping bag to ice between layers. this way the icing will be nice and thick and add height to the cake, it also stops the crumbs being picked up in your icing. If the outside colour of the cake is a different colour then the filling then I make sure the outer rim of the cake is piped the colour of the outside of the cake. the cake pictured below has caramel filling and a white outer layer

Happy baking Scandilovers

I would love to hear about your worst kitchen fails. comment below or on my Instagram page  @scandicakes 

xxx
Shannon

*I was just showing off what I was making for friends and family on instagram and suddenly I started getting real orders
** Straight after writing this, I had 2 cakes crumble in my hands because I took them out of their pans too early. Rookie mistake.