Icing a 12 inch square cake

[Electryone]

Im doing this next week for the bottom tier of a 3 tier birthday cake, bit nervous as I'm not that good at putting icing on the cake. I'm always thinking it will tear and I struggle to roll it and out and get it on smooth. Normally I roll it out on baking paper as I find it sticks to the work top, I bought a silicone mat and it sticks to that! Someone suggested cornflour, is this any good?

Anyway my main question is rolling it out big enough to cover the top and sides of the cake, googled it and it suggests I need 2 Kg of icing, my worktop isn't big enough anyway...what do you think is best? Rolling out a 1Kg at a time and putting it on in two parts?

I use icing flour and do it on a table for cakes this big. You really need 2 people to get the icing on or it could rip.

Thanks perfectly, never thought of using my dining table! So would I roll out all 2 kg at once then? Whats icing flour, is it icing sugar?

Yes. Do the 2 kg at once and yes it's icing sugar. Try to get it right on first go. The less you play with the icing the better. I usually would use more than 2 kg so you have some wiggle room.

Thanks again, will give it a go, the girl who wants the cake is coming along on the morning I ice it to make fake blood for it so she can help me! So over my table in icing sugar, roll out the icing and then lift, sounds ok!

Good luck

Make sure you knead the icing plenty, until its a very smooth ball. If you don't do this it won't be warmed and pliable and will rip/crack. Keep it fairly thick, 1/4 inch thick roughly. Use the palm of your hand (clean) to smooth it out once on the cake. Place it over the cake, lift each side gently and rub over the top with your clean hand. This gets air bubbles out, don't think because you can't see them they're not there! Then do one side at a time, slowly stretching the icing out as you smooth it to get a lovely shiny seam free finish! try YouTube? :)

Thanks perfectlypurple, think I will need it!

Thanks so much youreashoe, I watched a video on You Tube and saw them using a mat which I bought but as I said it keeps sticking to that!!

Basically she wants a 3 tier cake, 12, 10 and 8 inches!

Electryone, use spacers too, they help to give you the thickness you need.

Nannycook I had never heard of them until you said that, have bought some just now from Ebay - silly question but how do you use them when you are rolling out a large amount of icing?

Th, I never used them and couldn't understand why my icing seemed bulging when it was smooth to start with, someone told me to use them and now I never go with them as big amounts its still fine to use, I haven't done a 12 inch but did do 2 10 inch this week, so mush better to use than rolling it too thin.

I will give it a go, do you just keep moving them up your icing?

Yes you do, just make sure you enough fondant to start with, I measure the top and sides then roll out my fondant then measure that too, theres nothing worse the rolling it all out to find you dont have enough, let me know how you get on!

Will do, cake is for next Friday, I will put a picture on here...if it looks ok!