Have you ever wondered how on earth people make their own celebration cakes……Well wonder no longer, our step by step guide will show you how to decorate like a pro has made it!
In our guide we show how to decorate a Christmas cake as it is simply the most frequent type of celebration cake made. The basics are however the same, whether it is round, square or heart shaped… the only difference is the type of decoration applied afterwards.
View the full step-by-step photoshoot here.
Step 1
Place the cake on a foil board. Warm some apricot jam in a pan and brush it all over the cake using a pastry brush.
Step 2
Using some icing sugar dust the work surface and knead the marzipan until soft and roll it into the shape of ball. This will make it easier to roll out into a circle. Using a rolling pin begin rolling out the marzipan until it is big enough to fit the cake. Don’t worry if it is too big as any excess can be simply trimmed off with a knife.
Step 3
Gently lift the marzipan off the work surface and place over the cake smoothing it out evenly over the cake using your hands. If you have time you can leave in a cool place for at least one day before adding the icing to allow the marzipan to firm up. But if like us you can’t wait don’t worry the end result will still be perfect!
Step 4
Using what’s left of the warmed apricot jam (or if you want to you can use brandy for this bit) brush another layer over the marzipan. Dust some more icing sugar over the surface and roll out the white icing in the same way you did the marzipan. Gently drape the icing over the cake and begin to smooth all over with your hands or an icing smoother.
Step 5
Now you can be as imaginative as you like when deciding how to decorate the cake. For Christmas we used the Sweetly Does It Set of Two Holly Fondant Plunger Cutters but there are a selection of others also available including roses, stars, hearts, daisies, lillies, butterflies and snowflakes.
To use the cutters simply roll out some coloured sugarpaste / rolled fondant icing to the desired thickness and press the cutter into the icing and press down the plunger. Lift it off the icing and press the plunger again to release it from the cutter. Continue until you have the shapes you need to fill your cake.
Step 7
Finally wrap some ribbon or a fondant icing border around the base of the cake. The Sweetly Does It embossed rolling pins add an instant decoration to rolled fondant to then just cut out with a roller and wrap around the cake.
Whatever design you decide on, nothing can be too tricky in just 7 steps, so what are you waiting for.
View the full step-by-step photoshoot here.