Can you help me to ice a fancy cake?

[RamblingRosa]

Not sure if this is the right place for this.

I'm planning to make a butterfly cake for DD's 3rd birthday in a few weeks.

I'm good at baking so I'm not worried about the sponge bit but I'm a complete novice at decorating.

Does it definitely have to be royal icing? Is sugar paste the same thing? Should I make it myself or get ready to roll stuff? If I get ready to roll in white is there any way of colouring it or do you have to buy it pre-coloured? Do I need need to put jam or something on to stick the icing down?

Sorry, lots of questions but I really don't know what I'm doing! Might have to do a practice run so poor DD doesn't end up with a botched cake for her bday!

Thanks

please?

I use ready roll icing. You can colour it with food colouring. The pastes are best but the liquid ones are ok. Just keep kneeding it on some cornflour until the colour is even. Or, what I tend to do if I want a picture/pattern, is paint liquid food colouring on once the cake is iced. To get the icing to stick the best thing to use is a smooth butter icing of spreading consistancy. This ehlps to smooth the cake so you get a smoother finish with the roll out icing. You only need about 2mm of the butter icing though as otherwise you get lumps. HTH.

Ooh thanks puddlepuss. I was hoping someone would say I could just buy the white roll out icing and colour it. Do you get normal food colouring and paint it on with a normal paint brush or are there special things I need to buy?

I use the bog-standard ready roll icing, the liquid colours from Sainsbury's and small (water colour) paint brushes. I got by with just these for ages but now I've started doing cakes for other people I have a few 'cakey things' but they're not really necessary.

If you don't want to mix in food colouring you can get ready made coloured sugarpaste <a class="break-all" href="http://www.cakecraftshop.co.uk/cgi-bin/trolleyed_public.cgi?action=showprod_BFPSP250&url=www.cakecraftshop.co.uk/shop/8/107/index.htm" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">here. I have used them a few times and they are great.

Royal icing and sugarpaste are NOT the same.

Sugarpaste is soft, rollable icing that partially hardens whereas royal icing is smoothed over the cake with a knife and sets absolutely solid. It is also used for piping lace and other intricate details.

For your cake I would suggest sugarpaste and I would really recommend some professional quality stuff - I buy all mine from Squires kitchen here

You can use ready rolled stuff but it is much harder to work with and it doesn't take colour as well - if you want a bright colour you will struggle to achieve it.

Assuming you are doing a layered sponge the best way to cover it is with a thin layer of buttercream which will have the other advantage of filling all the lumps and bumps giving you a smoother finish.

Personally I wouldn't paint onto sugarpaste - you can do this but unless you use really good quality colours then the effect is a bit hit and miss.

I would cover the cake in one colour and then use either a heart or circle shaped cutter to cut small medium and large shapes in contrasting colours and layer them on the wings to give a "built up pattern" effect.

This is quite striking and also covers any little divots/pulls/lumps you might have in the sugarpaste.

good luck

Oh that's great thank you. And thanks for the links. I'm going to order some sugar paste and start practicing :)

Thanks for this thread as I am in a similar situation and had all the same questions about icing.

But I also wanted to ask, how far in advance can I make the sponge, and when can I ice it?

Party is on Saturday and I was thinking
of making cake on Wednesday and icing it on Thursday - would that be ok? My friend makes and freezes but I don't like the way it tastes when defrosted.

Thanks in advance
:)

That will be fine as long as you keep it in air tight container obviously

Before I icing I mean and afterwards just put it some where safe

DON'T put in fridge once iced

Thank you very much!

I was going to put it on a silver board with upside down cake tin on top - so once its iced I don't need to keep upside down cake tin on top of it?

(Yes I am a complete novice!)

If you haven't got an air tight container, just wrap with cling film,
once iced it will be air tight
but make sure to coat your whole cake with buttercream to get icing to stick