Fondant Jungle Baby Shower Cake

Here is a fondant jungle baby shower cake that my bakery made. It is very simple and was easy to make.

Here is what I did

Everything on here is fondant, with the exception of the tree. We wrapped a pretzel rod in chocolate fondant so it would stand up straight and be edible. We are big on everything being edible. I mean who would want to bite into a plastic straw, wooden dow, or metal wires holding their cake together.

It really amazes me on some of the ideas that our customers come up with.  They even draw out cake so we get their idea more clearly. This is one of those cakes. We would have preferred to do some of the decorations in buttercream, just our preference, but the customer wanted all fondant. She’s the boss and she loved her jungle baby shower cake.

Fondant Jungle Baby Shower Cake

Barbie Cake

Oh barbie, how we love thee! Barbie cakes are a huge seller at my bakery. Every little girl wants one. Here is just one of the many designs we make of the barbie cake. We can do any design that the customer thinks of. The only thing that stops their imagination sometimes is the rising price of their detailed designs.

Decorating Instrucions

The cake consist of  four 8 inch cakes, stacked on top of each other, rounded at the edges, buttercream iced, and decorated. We add a fondant plaque for the writing. We feel it gives our cake that extra special touch!

Lion Head Cake

The customer ordered a lion head cake and this is what we came up with. We decided to go for more of a cartoon look rather than real. It was for a child and we did not want him to be scared of the cake. It is a large round cake and 2 large cupcakes.

How I made it

The cake and cupcakes are iced tan and than airbrushed to give the lion a little dimension. His face is drawn on using buttercream and chocolate straws for his whiskers. His hair consist of different color icings striped in a bag, than piped out using a grass tip.lion's head cake

Winter Wonderland Cake

This is our Winter Wonderland Cake and cupcakes.  This is a easy classy design to achieve. I basically made some cupcakes, iced them blue, rolled them in sanding sugar, and added a fondant snowflake to them.  They can be made with any colors, I just suggest that you do use sanding sugar as it sparkles better!

For our cakes, we trimmed, iced them, and than added the sanding sugar to the top and sides by hand. We than stacked the three tiered cake and added a border to it. Borders can be tricky to add to these cakes if you have to much sugar around the base of the cake, so be careful!

Wreath Cake

Here is one of our versions of a wreath cake. It too is a popular seller at Christmas time. We generally sell out of these cakes very quickly, regardless of how many we make. They are very tasty but much more expensive than other cake that we make.

How I made it

It is a 8 inch cake covered in buttercream. The border of the cake is made from a leaf tip with green buttercream. We made straight red lines with a round tip, for the candles and than added a yellow flame with our rose tip bag. We piped on a buttercream bow on the side of the cake and than added it’s ribbon.

Wreath Cake

Christmas Tree Cake

It’s that time of year again where everything is merry and bright. Here is our first Christmas tree cake of the season! Ugly and gaudy I know, but the customers just love them.

How it is done

This Christmas tree cake was made in a shaped pan. It only comes in pound cake. It is iced in a poured fondant icing, tinted green. We covered the stump of the tree in chocolate buttercream and add buttercream decorations and Christmas sugars. It requires a lot of time and effort on our part, but the customers are so happy to see and buy them.Christmas Tree Cake

Baby Butt Cake

I am not a fan of this baby butt cake. I get the idea that the decorator was going for, but it is still just a baby butt cake with no head.

Directions

In order to create this cake the decorator used 2 cakes and set it up like a tradition tiered cake. On the top tier the decorator tried to round the cake so it was shaped more like a baby butt. She iced it white to look like a diaper, added some chocolate fondant legs, and added blanket to cover it all. She added polka dots to the entire cake to make it balanced and added a bow at the bottom.

I feel that at least some parts of this cake could have been done better, like adding fondant ruffles to the diaper area. This way it could cover up any imperfections in the icing. It would have also looked more realistic. The bow at the bottom could have been done better also.  The bows loops do not look to be the same size and it does not have that nice little wrinkle bows have or even ribbons.Baby Butt Cake

Cake Decorations

snowflake cakeI recently came across a cake website where the cake decorations were all fondant but the cake was buttercream. They looked great! These cakes were all perfectly iced and completely smooth. The decoration however was nothing but fondant.

I emailed the owner and when speaking to the designer of the cakes she said, “Most people hate the taste of fondant but they love the clean look of it. What I have done here is given the the best of two worlds and people seem to be happy.” I think that people just haven’t tasted the good fondant bakeries make or pay a lot of money for. That stuff is tasty!

So the next time your dealing with a customer who does not want an entire fondant iced cake mention using both like this designer did!

Fondant Fabric

So I just came across something called fondant fabric online. Let me  say this product is not for professionals! I can use up to 60 pounds of fondant per week. Theses sheets are only good for covering up to a 14 inch cake. At $25.00 a pop I much rather spend $60 bucks for 20 pounds and cover more than 3 cakes. It would cost you $75 bucks to cover three cakes with these sheets. Oh and what if they rip on you, than your out of luck! I believe these sheets are made for the novice decorator who does not know to much about kneading or rolling out fondant. So if you are one of those  people give it a try, as for me I’m sticking with arm strength and my rolling pin.

Piping Sugar Veil

Piping Sugar VeilI recently tried sugar veil for the very first time.  I was so excited to use it, the articles I had read on it made it seem so easy to do. Damask was my pattern of choice for my first time, needless to say it was  hard to do! Maybe it was the detailed pattern or maybe it was the sugar veil. The sugar veil was the consistency of melted marshmallows and it was extremely hard to pipe. Once I finished one line and pulled the bag away, the sugar veil would make a peak on the end of the line that I than had to fix. When I finished piping my designs I was only 80% please with the look. However when I picked up the design to place on my cake I was 100% pleased because it was flexible and easy to do. Now I probably will use it again but maybe not for very detailed patterns.

Making Cake Templates

Making Cake TemplatesIn my business I make  a lot of 2D cakes. For these cakes I always make a template to put on top of my cake before I cut into it. Some templates I make freehand and some I make using the kopy kake machine.  Either way, I always cut a piece of cardboard to the size I need and sketch out the design I need onto it. After I finish, I cut out the design and place it onto my cake.  Once I have cut out my design from the cake, I may need to cut some free hand work but I never do it all freehand!

Airbrushing Camouflage

Airbrushing CamouflageAirbrushing camouflage is very easy to do. I usually do green camouflage. I start out with a white cake and than airbrush it a light shade of green.  Next, I airbrush a medium shades of green ink spots, than brown ink spots in airbrush than black spots to the cake. Finally if needed, I go over the entire cake in green again to make the cake just a little bit dark.

Tie dyed Fondant

Tie dyed FondantTie dyed fondant is a bit tricky. No two pieces will ever come out the same. The fondant is more marbleized than Tie dyed. I suggest getting a few colors of fondant you would like to use and placing them side by side. Roll the fondant in a ball, cut that ball in half once or twice and place it side by side again. Now roll the fondant in a ball again, than roll the fondant flat to the thickness that you need.