Tips for Decorating a Cake with Royal Icing

More fun & productivity with

HOME | Signup FREE | Submit Articles | | Blog

Tips for Decorating a Cake with Royal Icing - By: Josephine Gauttier, Posted on: 2008-04-26

Are you getting ready to learn more about cake decoration? Have you always wanted to decorate a cake all by yourself, but have been terrified of the results? If so, here are some tips to get the novice by as you strive to become a great and wonderful cake decorator.

How to Use Your Royal Icing

It doesn't matter if you are working on a real or a fake practice cake, you should strive to use a royal icing that is made with egg white. You will probably find many different kinds of royal icing, including those that are made with meringue powders. Try to avoid these. Always opt for more natural royal icing that is made with egg white. Royal icing works best with small decorative tips; you may use small tips such as # 0 and # 1. You should always make sure to re sift confectioner's sugar before you make icing.

Applying Decorations with Royal Icing

When you are applying decorations with royal icing, you will want to make sure that you are using small tips. Decorations of royal icing will tend to apply better when they are applied using very small tips. If you are using a pastry bag, choose the smallest sized pastry bag that you can find, such as a pastry bag that is 8". Icing decorations will also apply better when the icing is thinner than normal. You should never fill in a pastry bag that is more than 1/4 full of icing.

Using Rolled Fondant Icing

Working with rolled fondant icing can be tricky. Here are some helpful tips for decorating using rolled fondant. First, if you have to work with rolled fondant icing, you should try to always have some wax paper handy. Wax paper can be really helpful when working with fondant icing because you can use it as a template pattern. When you are working with a wax template patter, you should be sure to make all of it line up and make sure the patterns are even. If you are working to make patterns, you can use accordion folds to achieve cool designs. In order to make sure that your cake pattern fits, you may want to place your cake pattern on the cake directly and pin it into place.

Different Ways to Use Rolled Fondant to Decorate

There are many different ways to use rolled fondant in order to decorate. The most common ways to use rolled fondant is to use lace pieces. You can use a trace pattern for this. Here are some ideas for working with lace pieces. You can create decorative bubble work for the border using a very small tip, either a size 1 or size 2. Other popular patterns that you should make sure to insert first include pattern pressing, crimping and ribbon insertion. The ribbon insertion patter is one of the most popular of these lacework designs. This pattern makes it look a like a piece of lace ribbon is being laced in and out of the cake.

Tips for Creating Decorative Lacework

You will need an exacto knife to achieve this effect. Make sure that all of your ribbons are cut to the same length. Use the exacto knife to make insertion slits on the cake. Another popular technique is to do curtain work on the cake. In most cases, you will need a small tip, because smaller tips provide line breakages. You will want to start by building scallops and a bridge. Use a marked patter in order to make sure that you get the design right, as it can be tricky.

Article Source: http://www.girlarticles.com

Josephine Gauttier is the author of the popular eBook "The Art of Cake Decorating". You can find more information about cake decorating at www.artofcakedecorating.com