...to hate the plethora of cakes with sheet fondant icing and fancy artwork

[CaptainTripps]

I mean these kinds of cakes are lovely to look at but I really would rather have a lovely, plain old Victoria sponge without all that disgusting sheet fondant.

Birthday parties especially. I remember from childhood delicious, crooked and slightly out of shape sponge cakes with some candles plonked in the middle.

Now it's all overly sweetened, chemically tasting and bland and uniform.

I've seen those amazing themed creations on Facebook too. Barely any cakes and all icing/decoration.

Bring back the old fashioned cake!

YANBU.

Icing is disgusting. Pure sugar. Instant diabetes.

I'll share your victoria sponge .

worse still - marzipan lurking under the fondant icing like the malevolent almondy horror that it is....

Yanbu. I love a plain old lemon drizzle cake, me.

YANBU

Yes they look great but too much icing to eat and quite often the cake itself isn't up to much either.

I prefer a nice home made sponge... full of proper butter...maybe with buttercream too!

yesterday at a party there was this huge round cake with zebra icing and lots of decorations. On cutting it had 5 layers of alternate pink and cream sponge. The icing was discovered to be a kind of molded marzipan as were the decorations . The cake was foul and none of the children ate it . I nibbled a bit and then ditched it.
I do make the fondant coverings I confess but underneath my cakes are yummy ..

YANBU though I hate the word "plethora" almost as much.

I'm all about the buttercream. Sheet icing makes me gag. A nice plain victoria sponge is good too.

I hate that fondant stuff its all sort of chewy and peels off yuk!

My dad used to makes cakes, wedding, birthday Christmas etc. he always made his icing with I think, icing sugar, glycerine and maybe a touch of water (I don't have his cake making skills )

I remember him putting on layers of very thin icing all smoothed out with a palette knife dipped in water and then decorated with the most exquisite patterns with piping tube things. Used to take him hours but that was his hobby and they were beautiful

YANBU

I love proper royal icing (and marzipan!) but that fondant icing is disgusting. Most Christmas cakes you can buy use it and it is the ruin of a good cake

That sounds lovely MrsPresley.

Poppadom - I was secretly chuffed with my use of the word 'plethora'. Damn.

YABU.

I love icing! children seem to like them too. Some of them look and taste amazing.

Nothing special about a plain sponge that you can have any old day.

Royal icing is the work of the devil. Even more so when there's marzipan involved. There really is no excusing marzipan on a cake.

Yes, Yes to what Amberleaf said. We need more sugar - not less!!

I peel the fondant off cakes. Have trained the DCs to do it too, they now say it's too sweet. I'd rather have my own home made buttercream or even choc fudge topping if I'm decorating a cake, where I know what's in it.

Not just the sugar, it's the food colouring - even more so since DD went to a party when she was smaller - she came back (whether overexcitement, food colouring or sugar, of combination thereof), had epic tantrum and the next day did a bright green poo (entirely bright green, like the kind of thing a leprechaun might produce. No brown whatsoever. The loo paper looked like she'd been mopping up a spill of poster paint. Thank goodness it wasn't bright red or I would have been calling an ambulance.)

Marzipan and royal icing on the other hand on a nice fruit cake - I could eat that all day. Ommm.

Yanbu. I hate icing and I don't really like cake. Cake gets thrown out in our house, none of us are fussed.

YANBU, it's horrible stuff. Love buttercream or a rich ganache.

I know people who actually like fondant. They are weird.

Me too! It tastes disgusting. I don't need an artwork cake.
I like how cake looks on it's own.

With you on the disgusting icing, but Vivipru, you are just wrong. Marzipan is the food of the Gods I tell you.

I prefer a rich fruit cake and junk the icing and marzipan. Those spectacularly decorative cakes are a triumph of style over substance. Plethora is a good word and I can't understand any dislike of it.

Imo the problem lies in today's super-sized portions.

Iced cakes are usually designed to be cut into a high number of portions. That way even if it is fondant icing you only get a tiny amount on the outside edge and the majority of your portion is actual cake. So traditionally, for say a wedding cake, you would get literally a small square or rectangle of cake with perhaps a couple of cms of icing at most.

Absolutely agree that you can't beat a plain fairy cake or victoria sponge etc for every day treats, but icing has it's place on special occasion cakes and if only used that way it doesn't get too much.

Yabu. I make the disgusting cakes you mentioned. I personally don't like icing myself or even cake but I make them for friends and family. My nephews think the cakes I make are awesome. I always do a theme of what they are into. I put a lot of time, effort and love into making these types of cake. They are always appreciated and I love the look on peoples faces when they see the cakes.

I only decorate with buttercream, royal icing at a push.

I may have to stop. My friend only got one slice of her birthday cake, everyone else snarfed the lot

I like all cake, all icing and marzipan. Just pass them all my way.

YANBU.
Bloody horrible things they are. Even the kids dont like them.