Cake Decorating supplies

xxdilemmaxx

I am attempting my first tiered birthday cake for my mother's 50th birthday in May. Have a recipe already sorted but I am looking for square cake tins, white modelling chocolate, and a square cake board. Would also be interested in flower cutters and a balling tool...

Anyone know the cheapest place to get these, would I be better to buy online?

Eviledna

Support Irish - this lady in Galway has a great range for all you need...

http://www.stuff4cakes.ie/

xxdilemmaxx

Thanks Eviledna, but had a look at the 10 inch and 8 inch square cake tins and they are working out at over €36 for both tins, sounds kinda expensive?

Is that a reasonable price or would I get them anywhere cheaper?

Eviledna

Oh sorry thought you needed just boards, not tins.

I'd head to TK maxx, I get most of my tins in there, you should be able to get both for ~20.

Or tescos might have the 8 inch one anyway, you might get lucky with 10 too. If you were in Galway I'd be sending you to Tommy Vardens catering supplies, but tbh I spent €15 there on a 12" round aluminium tin for the sis' wedding cake, so the larger tins can get up there.

xxdilemmaxx

Ok so it's proving to be too expensive/messy for the square cake tins so I have changed my plans, I'm going to make a 2 tiered cake and decorate with sugar daisies, something along the lines of this, but with 2 tiers instead of 3:

http://www.marthastewartweddings.com/photogallery/sugar-flower-wedding-cakes?#slide_16

Few quick questions, can I do the actual cake as choc buscuit cake or would it need to be a sponge cake?

I need the cake for a birthday party on sat 7th may so what order would I need to make the cake to have it in time, would a sponge cake stay fresh if baked on the Thursday and decorated on Friday? I presume if I could use choc buscuit cake it would stay fresh for a couple of days?
I am thinking of putting the cake on a large cake board, covered with fondant and writing the Happy Birthday bit on the board?

Does this cake look very difficult for a beginner? I am fairly handy in the kitchen but have never attempted a cake like this before!

Acoshla

Chocolate biscuit cake would be perfect, it will stay fresh for at least a week giving you plenty of time to get it ready. You could do the 2nd tier madeira (fluffy sponge is too light to support the sugarpaste properly) and that way you could have both flavours, and you wouldn't need to dowel the bottom tier if it was choc biscuit. The madeira/baked cake layer could be made the 2 days before the party, then the sugarpaste on the same day or the next day, once the sugarpaste is on it the cake is effectively sealed in and airtight so will stay fresher longer than a cake that was exposed. So you could make the chocolate biscuit any time in the week before the party, cover it, then bake the other one, cover it, decorate, all done by Saturday and spread out nicely over the week.

The flowers could be made well in advance so I wouldn't think it'd be too difficult from that point of view.

Edit: Oh yeah and good idea about putting it on a wider board, I always do, you'll end up sticking your fingers into it trying to move it if it's right out at the edge of the board.

xxdilemmaxx

Sorry for all the questions Spadina (you've been a great help!), but I am going to buy my supplies from this site:

http://www.stuff4cakes.com/index.php/cPath/34_127?osCsid=74f29140a5d303f38e847304d1b62809

For the fondant covering do I use just Regalice in yellow? Any idea (aaprox) of how much I would need to buy to cover an 8 inch and 10 inch cake and a board?

For the flowers do I just buy the white sugar florist paste and a yellow blossom tint?

For the daisies are these ok if I buy medium and large:

http://www.stuff4cakes.com/product_info.php/cPath/31_69/products_id/1064?osCsid=74f29140a5d303f38e847304d1b62809

Acoshla

I was just out at stuff4cakes yesterday

If you want a nice soft yellow I would buy white icing and tint it with yellow paste or a little pack of yellow icing (250g). I think a 5kg box of the icing would be the best idea, an 8 inch will take about 1.5-2kg of icing to cover to give you an ideaa (better to err on side of more than less) and then you can use that icing to make the flowers too, there wouldn't be any need to buy the specific flower paste if you didn't want to. You'd get the board covered too with that. Yellow icing is very yellow but you want a lighter shade, but maybe give stuff4cakes a call, tell her what you're planning and she can advise you too. If you got a Wilton yellow paste colour you could use that for the centres of your flowers (either little balls of coloured sugarpaste or paint them) and for colouring the icing for your cake.

The blossom cutters are perfect, I use them all the time, I think stuff4cakes also have Daisy cutters that are similar if you'd prefer them, but the little blossoms are lovely and very popular.

If you need any more help feel free to PM me

xxdilemmaxx

Thanks - you're a legend

I will post pics up in 2 weeks fingers crossed!

tootired

If making a madeira cake, I'd cover it in buttercream chill for a few hours and then cover in sugar paste. Having buttercream on a cake makes it easier to cover in sugar paste....I say that now but have never iced a cake without buttercream. It tastes nicer with buttercream on it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=We26gwKS_tw

The above link is very good for showing how to cover a cake in sugar paste. Just make sure your buttercream layer is as smooth as possible.

The cake for your mum is very pretty!

xxdilemmaxx

I read your username as twotiered, think I'm having cake overload!!

tootired

:D:D

xxdilemmaxx

Few last questions, have both cakes made and am covering holes later with ganache, anyone have a good recipe or is it just equal parts cream and choc?

Tomorrow I will be covering both cakes and the board with sugarpaste. Any ideas on how to get the icing all the same colour, I take it I will have to mix one massive amount of sugarpaste with the coloured paste to do this?
How much paste approx will this take for a pale pink colour?
Anyone any ideas on how much sugarpaste to use to cover a 14inch board, 10 inch and 8 inch cake?

Thanks happy bakers!

Eviledna

I made ganache last weekend following the twice chocolate to cream recipe. It turned out great and worked with good quality white choc too! When you say you are "covering holes" are you sure buttercream wouldn't be a safer option? It's a little thicker...


Spadina showed us how to estimate how the size of the roll of sugar paste you need in her course, basically put the cake on it's board, measure with a tape it's height + diameter +height and include the board if you are gonna ice the board too. That is the diameter of your rolled icing you need.

As for how much, well if 2kg will do an 8 incher, it's prolly more like twice that for your 14" (4kg) and probably 3KG for the 10". That's 9KG, it's probably more cost effective to get two 5KG boxes so, just be sure.
And from my wedding cake experience last year, I cannot stress how important it is to ROLL IT THICK! Mine cracked on the 12" on top with no time to re-do, so I had to cover it with flowers. With icing, more is definitely more!
Can't help with the tint issue, that's one for Spadina.

And...well done you for being so brave. It will work out really well.:)

EDIT: [BTW, if you haven't got a sufficiently large rolling pin, get to B&Q or woodies or the like and get some plastic pipe cut to size. Worked a treat for me!]

tootired

That seems like an awful lot of sugar paste and may squish a light 2 tiered cake. I've just made a 3 tier cake 8" 10" and 12" all at least 3.5" high all on individual boards and including covering the boards completely I used just over 5kg of sugar paste.

I've just looked up a few of my books and they recommend

between 850g - 1kg sugar paste for an 8" x 3.5"cake
between 1.25kg - 1.5kg for a 10" x 3.5" cake
900g to cover a 12" board completely.

So maybe 5kg would be sufficient even if you roll the icing very thick. I would say that if the icing is too thin or too thick the icing will rip, too thin won't be strong enough and too thick will drag at the edge and rip too.

My books have the following tips to avoid icing cracking

1. Make sure sugar paste is kneaded well but not sticky
2. Use very little icing sugar as it dehydrates, I use cornflour
3. Roll out no thinner than 4mm
4. add a 2nd layer for a smoother finish - I only do this for wedding cakes.
5. Handle the sugar paste lightly(easier said than done;) and drape over the cake.

Acoshla

I normally have 1.5kg to cover an 8 inch round, but when I say I would have all of that an 8 inch will really only take 1/1.1 kg of icing, if covering a little bit thick which I would recommend for a beginner especially when it's chocolate biscuit cake you're covering. A 2kg box would ideally get you pretty far with an8 inch and a 6 inch tier, as tootired said I also use 5kg boxes and will get a 3 tier covered with that easily.

But I would err on leaving the icing slightly thicker for covering this chocolate biscuit cake when it's for a special occasion and you don't want it tearing/bumpy etc. One of the women at my class the last day used exactly 1.1kg of icing on her 8 inch and it was the only one that cracked and tore a little, so I always find it better to have the extra bit of leeway, I prefer to have that bit to cut off after than to be stretching the exact amount.

xxdilemmaxx

Thanks everyone for your help with this, especially Spadina who I harassed by PM

Well, it's finished finally. When I measured the cakes they were actually 7 and 9 inches, didn't see these responses before I coloured the icing so had only 3k of icing done, eek! Covered the two cakes grand, but for the board I could only cover the edges so it was a bit of a nightmare! Rolled a long strip and kinda wrapped that around the uncovered board. The icing didn't crack but it is thin enough, is there a chance it will crack when it dries out completely?

Happy enough with it considering I didn't even know what sugarpaste was 2 weeks ago, although I can spot loads of imperfections in it! It looks nothing like its meant to but I'm sure my Mam will love it....

One question, how do you move an iced cake? I tried to move my top tier I dented the bottom of it, sliding implements under it. That's what the big dent in the ribbon is!

Now time for a glass of vino I think, I'll probably drop the thing on the way to the party tomo

Acoshla

Oh it looks so lovely! It won't crack when it dries, if it's going to crack it does it when you're putting it on, then it just starts to dry. I move iced cakes with a big pallette knife and by putting the palms of my hands on the sides of the cake if I have to, the less touching of the icing the better obviously, but once it dries it's pretty firm.

tootired

That's a fantastic cake, you'd never know that it was your first tiered cake. I love the colour. I couldn't see any dents or cracks, but we are our own worst critics!! If the cake hasn't cracked when icing it, it shouldn't crack when it dries out a bit. Moving a cake onto the board is always tricky, and my least favourite part of decorating(so much can go wrong at this point) If time permits try and cover the cake at least a full day before you need it. Let it dry out overnight and then move it onto a cake board, Less chance of denting but if something goes wrong it's much harder to fix at this point. If the cake is to be decorated with flowers etc I would after the overnight drying place the cake on the board and then decorate, that way if there are any dints or cracks they cn be covered up with flowers or whatever the decoration is.

Agin great job, so pretty I bet your Mum'll love it.

Eviledna

Wow,well done!! That's a fantastic job, especially for a first go, and I love the way you curved the flowers
I hope this is the start of a wonderful new hobby for you. Your mum will be delighted!