Sugarcraft chat

[wem]

I started a thread for cake people a while back but it got a bit lost in Chat so thought I'd try to tempt people into our lovely new baking topic.

Hopefully I'll see some of the posters from the chat thread, but for any new people popping in, introductions: I'm wem, I'm a recent cake obsessive and have been bothering mumsnetters about it a fair bit as I'm starting up cake decorating business. I don't have anywhere near the experience or knowledge of some of the posters in here, but I do have an excessive willingness to chat about cake :)

Let's try this again, eh?

Amazon has them

Thanks, blueberry - it's the £5+ delivery that I didn't like much, but it looks like there isn't much choice - everyone else who lists them seems to be out of stock

thanks Stealthsquiggle, very expensive though? but you probaly dont use alot do you? could you get away with the chocolate sugarpaste in regal ice? or better to use flower paste and colour it brown? any tips?

You can get smaller packs of that stuff! I only used it because I bought a big pack for a special cake I did earlier in the year and have loads left (in fact, chocolate sugarpaste has been a common theme in the last few cakes, for that very reason). It tastes better than the ordinary stuff, but you could absolutely use this stuff or, even better (but expensive again), this

Nanny - Our Sainsburys stock packs of chocolate fondant for about £1.50

Stealth - I hadn't looked at postage sorry.

blueberryboy - it's still actually the best deal - the only alternative I found was a Dutch seller, whose price was good, but shipping was even more

I have given myself a good slap - dark chocolate will do fine for village fete pirate cake pops, FGS - I may will stock up on black candy melts when they come back into stock for halloween.

wem, it's pointless learning how to do royal icing nowadays. Nobody asks for it; I can do it to a pretty high standard but have never done any royal iced work apart from my own wedding cake and some exam/competition pieces.

Learn it for your own enjoyment but don't expect to get any return for your investment. In the 18 years I've been doing cake decorating I've never been asked for it once

Stealth - you could try colouring up white chocolate with either black sugarflair or petal dust. Might work ?

Just wanted to share an excellent little thing that happened to me tonight. I've got a wedding fayre in August and I really wanted some wedding cake boxes to give samples away in but the nice ones are too expensive so I shelved the idea.

went into work today and the wedding from Saturday had chucked away 100 of these type boxes - already folded up !! Very happy :)

I would like to make a paintbrush recommendation to everyone that does painting or brush embroidery - a Warhammer dry brush . I've stopped doing WH now and grabbed a couple of my brushes the other day for a cake (waste not want not) and was very pleased with the performance of the dry brush. It's short and stumpy and a pleasure to use

Ooh, that's interesting Nigel, I've been wondering about buying some new brushes as I want to try painting. Although I had to google as I wasn't sure if dry brush was a technical description or just a brush that was dry :) What size would you say?

What a stroke of luck with those cupcake boxes, very pleasing when things like that happen. And thanks for the tip on the royal icing - I won't bother just yet then with so much else to learn!

Midori - sorry, missed your comment back down thread, I've seen Alan Dunn's books, they look great but unfortunately none in the library - on to the list it goes! :)

You can also have private tuition with Alan Dunn.

I have to say, i agree with Nigel about royal icing. it is something I would love to do well, but it is down my list of priorities for that reason. I think as fruit cakes become are less popular as wedding/celebration cakes now, it was inevitable that RI would go down in popularity. I do know some people who RI sponge cakes, but I know purists balk at the idea. Pity, royal icing tastes so much better than fondant.

nanny, I have used home made modelling chocolate to make chocolate roses. It's quite easy and you can probably find an online tutorial for it. You don't need a cutter.

I bet that's cheap midori!

I have another question I'm afraid - I've been asked to do a cake with just buttercream, no fondant. Would you still display on a fondant covered board?

Nigel - do you reckong colouring white chocolate would work? I am always wary of adding anything, even paste, to chocolate in case it siezes. Petaldust possibly - but I don't have any and I am trying determined not to spend any more money on stuff that I won't get paid for, so cheapest possible dark chocolate will have to do.

Got two orders today - a birthday cake and a wedding cake on the back of the wedding fayre I did in January. Well chuffed and to celebrate I have bought myself a Mr Site takeaway website and a Mr Dominos takeaway pizza

I'm not sure whether it would work - all I can say is that I coloured some white chocolate with red sugarflair last weekend and it was OK. I would probably have added a tiny bit of cocoa butter for more fluidity if I'd thought about it but I didn't at the time (which is sad as I have about 1.5kg of the stuff)

thanks midori. Wow i find myself with 5 cakes to make in the next few weeks, everyone i've given glasses out to i've told i'm into making cakes, am well chuffed if not alittle nervous, how much would you charge for a 9inch round plain cake? i really need to work this out, i've just made a 6inch for a girl in work and i'm charging her £10. about right do you think?

Ok, I have DH's provisional agreement to a kitchenaid purchase , but I have to be sure they're worth the money. Are they practically better at cakes than a Kenwood, or does everyone just love the look of them? I'd post a new thread asking the question, but there have been a million threads about KA vs Kenwood, and they all end up with people saying how pretty their machines are - so I thought I'd ask you serious cake bods :)

Not many people have both to do the direct comparison, I don't think, wem.

I have the low-end commercial KA - this one - so not just a pretty face, and I think the build quality is way better than the pretty ones (judging from poking those in shops lots). It feels like it is designed to live in a commercial kitchen - it's tough and easy to clean and I love it lots. My only Kenwood experience is a very long time ago, at which time they were functional but ugly.

I have the very cheap kenwood Prospero, it's great, really, but not very tough, I don't know how long it will last (but I'm pretty gentle with it). I think I'd rather get a decent kenwood for the same price as the kitchenaids, granted they're not as pretty, but have far more power and are pretty indestructible from what I've heard. Then again I can't help but drool of the pictures of the kitchenaids...

one of the things I like that mine has which the pretty KAs don't is an overload switch so I know I can't kill it even by getting it to knead colour into several kgs of sugarpaste because my hands are aching too much - if I am hurting it then it will reset.

Great, now I want the commercial one instead

It's hard without the direct comparison, and everyone who has either of them seems to love them, but there have been a couple of posters who have stated the KA is better for baking whereas the Kenwood is more of a multitasker. I wish I could remember who said it/where it was said, as I didn't ask why at the time.

The power thing seems to be a bit of a red herring Viking, as the KA's have a direct drive wotsit which mean you get the same power out of different wattages, or something.

The KAs do sound sturdier, some criticisms about the Kenwoods are about being plastic-y and flimsy feeling.

What do you suppose is the difference between the artisans and this?

oh, it says slightly smaller bowl and less powerful motor...