Covering Wedding Cakes with Fondant, Covering Cakes

QUESTION & ANSWERS (Peg's answers are in blue):

Your site is FABULOUS!!!! Your website is so detailed and simplies everything so much that even someone as bad a cook as me is willing to try. My task at hand is to make a wedding cake. I have followed your instructions and the following questions came up:

(1) I tried using the MM Fondant recipe and its great except when I roll the fondant out, I notice these little hard bit in the fondant. It almost look like little crystal sharp bits. What causes that and how can I fix this?

The sugar was not dissolved in. That is why the “crystals” in the fondant.

Did you use fresh marshmallows? If they were getting dried and crusty, you would have a problem.

Did you allow the fondant to sit overnight at least and knead again? That allows the little powder sugar clumps to absorb the moisture and then kneading works them into the fondant.

Did you use a Cane Sugar? The Beet sugars can clump up and be very difficult to work with.

Make the MM Fondant in advance and knead before using to help break up the crystal problems.

(2) Like many others, when covering a round cake with fondant, I have the problem of folds on the sides of the cake. I have tried smoothing it over with my hands, but am not very successful. Are the folds cause by my fondant being too small and not rested on a higher area (like a coffee tin) so the ends can drape?

No matter what you do, the circumference of a large circle ( the fondant covering ) will ALWAYS be larger than a small circle ( the cake bottom ).

Use a turning cake table (or can if you must) and practice.

One trick you might try is to take your cake and cake board off the turntable and put it on a large coffee can on the counter.

Roll out your fondant a bit thicker and about 2 inches larger than needed.

Buttercream your cake, then place your fondant over the suspended cake. This will allow the fondant to stretch and go past the bottom of the cake and drape in the air. The area that has the tendency to fold and ripple should now be floating in the air below the cake. Trim off the excess fondant for ease of handling. On one side, start “attaching” the fondant by gently pressing the fondant into the buttercream. Go to the opposite side and gently press until the fondant is attached and work your way around the cake.

In other words think of a clock face. Gently press the fondant in at 12, go to 6 and press, go to 9 and press, then go to 3 and press. If necessary, go to between 12 and 3 and gently press then go to between 6 and 9 and press, etc. until the fondant is completely attached. Go around as many times as you need to until all the ripples are blended in.

You can move your cake on the cake board back to the turntable or decorate the cake sitting on top of the can. If you leave it on the can, please be careful while you decorate. It can be very unstable.

(3) My next questions are about the "glue" between the fondant and the cake: I know jam is a popular choices to use as the "glue". When I tried it, my cake ended up very lumpy with jam-covered finger prints all over it. How can I make this easier & neater?

I’m sorry. I’ve never heard of Jam being used as the Glue to attach fondant EXCEPT in the case of making Petit Fours. Then you will only have about a 1 ½ inch square of fondant covering the top o a piece of cake. If and when jam is used, it is well strained before applying it to the cake. The buttercream is a cushion and helps mask flaws on the cakes surface under the fondant.

Use fresh Buttercream as your “glue” to the cake.

(4) Will it be easier to make the cake smooth if I used buttercream instead? Do you have a good, easier, user-friend buttercream recipe I can use?

Check out my Buttercream Icing 101: http://whatscookingamerica.net/PegW/ButtercreamIcing.htm

(5) My concern about buttercream is melting, as I am planning to make this about 3 days before the wedding. Will an air-conditioned room be sufficient to keep it from melting?

It won’t melt is an average temperature room. Buttercream that is made from pure Butter can get droopy at about the high mid to high 80’s. A Buttercream that is made from a Crisco can do pretty well up to the high 90’s. Buttercream that is made from pure Crisco will survive past 100 degrees.

QUESTION & ANSWERS (Peg's answers are in blue):

Do you think cakes will support the fondant without any problem?

The denser cake should work fine. You can add a bit (about 2 tablespoons) of flour if you want but I’d just simply prepare and bake the cake and then hand press down on the cakes dome immediately upon taking the cake out of the oven. (Use a tea towel so that you don’t burn yourself.) That will make the cake denser but not change the chemistry of the cake.

I did make a cake this weekend and used BCSM cake mix also but it was chocolate. and it was fine I made a 6" and 8 " round and stacked them.

You MUST use the dowel system for stacking a wedding cake otherwise you flirt with disaster for a typical stacked cake.

But it seems that white cakes are more airy because of the egg whites. The cake I am making is 14",12";10", 8" and 6" - all on pedestals (like stairway) I have been waking up at 3:30 every morning worrying about this... help...tell me its going to be fine! I am in Northern California. Again your site is great!

Use baking cores when you bake the 12 and 14 inch cake. If you don’t you will very likely have overcooked outside edges and uncooked middle.

QUESTION & ANSWERS (Peg's answers are in blue):

I am planning to make my granddaughter a five-tier wedding cake using fondant icing. I experimented with an 8-inch cake and had no problems. But I am so scare of icing a 14 and 12-inch cake. Are there any special tricks on lifting up the rolled fondant to put on the cake?

I roll them up like a large pie crust. You might need an extra pair of hands for the large roll of fondant if you don’t have a cake lifter.

Could the cake be frozen and iced quickly with buttercream so it can be handled better and placed on a pastry cloth where the fondant has been rolled out on and then raise the icing up and around the sides and then lift the cake back on a coffee can to continue smoothing out the wrinkles?

I understand what you are saying, but you would NEVER roll out fondant on a Pastry Cloth. The fondant would imbed itself into the cloth and you may never get it all off.

What I just typed probably doesn't make sense. I'm just trying to think of a way to get the icing on the cake without tearing it. For the smaller cakes I don't think I'll have a problem. This will be an outside wedding in mid July and very hot. I also wanted to put a filling inside the layers, but I don't know how that would work with the hot weather.

Using any type of fruit filling and buttercream between layers would be a good safe way to go.