My Delicious Cake & Decorating Supplies

Hints & Tips

Sugar Shaper

A sugar shaper is absolutely essential for novelty work. Most come complete with interchangeable discs, making them a great tool for creating hair, grass, posts and much more.

Softening your paste is the secret to getting the right consistency. Add cooled boiled water to the paste until it starts to stick to your hands. If the shaper clicks, your paste is still too hard!

When rolling out your paste, spacers will help you achieve an even thickness. You can make one yourself from strips of wood. Barbeque skewers also serve as excellent narrow spacers.

Keep It Clean

A clean work station makes cake decorating a breeze.

Remove crumbs of paste, off-cuts, crusted royal icing and rubbish of any kind so your icing stays clean and your cake looks amazing.

Icing Guidelines

To determine approximately how much marzipan and sugar paste is needed to cover your cake, follow the chart below.

Cake Mountain

You’ve rolled, mixed, baked and sweated to create your culinary sensation. The moment arrives to take it out of the oven and you are surprised to see that the middle of the cake is far higher than the rest of it. So why does this happen?

Some reasons include:

• The oven temperature may have been too high.
• There may have been too much flour in the cake.
• You may have over mixed the cake.
• The pan may be too full.
• The pan’s colour could be too dark or dull.

General Cake Making Tips

1. Make sure you have all of the ingredients before you begin!
2. For best results, ensure your ingredients are at room temperature.
3. Pre-heat the oven to the temperature specified in the recipe. A cool oven may make the cake too heavy to rise.
4. Use the tin size specified in the recipe. Tins that are too big can cause the cake to be thin and heavy. If they’re too small, the cake may overflow.
5. Prepare the cake tin. Generally, this means greasing the base and sides with a thin layer of oil, butter or margarine.
6. If recommended by the recipe, evenly sprinkle the tin with a light coat of flour.
7. Use grease proof paper for cakes that require a long baking time.
8. For heavier cakes, such as rich fruit cakes, tie a brown paper bag around the outside to protect it. If the top starts to burn, protect it with a piece of paper or foil.
9. Use the right flour. An exception is substituting plain flour for self-raising flour. This can be done if baking powder is added as a raising agent. (Usually 4 level teaspoons per 1 pound of flour.)
10. Remove lumps by sifting flour, icing sugar etc.