Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Not All Icing is Deadly

This has not even the tiniest thing to do with aviation, is a blatant abuse of my captive audience, and won't even offer the entertainment value of affronted Texans, but I want to show you my cake.

I like cake. Well, everybody likes cake, right? It's pretty and tasty, offers the opportunity to share, and often denotes a happy occasion. I've been reading the Cake Wrecks blog for a while now. It's written by Jen, a crazy geek with a sense of humour I share, and it features hilarious commentary on the most sidesplittingly horrendous cakes that professional bakers can create. Once a week, Jen gives my laughing muscles a break and features beautiful cakes. Some of them are so smooth and perfect I wondered how anyone could make icing like that, and then by reading the comments I discovered it was called fondant and a little googling found me a recipe and some instructions.

Instead of spreading fondant icing on with a knife, you roll it out like pie crust and then pick it up in a sheet and drape it over the cake. It has enough body that you can make ripples and folds with it. You can also cut it with a cookie cutter or a knife to make ribbons and patterns, or shape it into little figures like play-dough. I tried it out.

This is my first effort. It has lots of flaws. You can see that it isn't smooth and perfect. I didn't spend very long smoothing the icing into perfection before I put it on the cake, because I just wanted to try it out. I left a crinkle in the edge because I liked the way the fold looked, and wanted to see if it would crack or anything. The next one I make will have airplanes.

17 comments:

nec Timide said...

Mmmm cake. Very pretty too. Almost too pretty to eat. Almost.

Anonymous said...

Yes, her cake looks good. Icing artistry, hope it's chocolate underneath. But don't look at most of cakewrecks for edible tasty looking cake. As Aviatrix warns, the usual cake there is ... stunning.

The one today is ... um. well, octuplet nightmare is all I can say.

dpierce said...

But is it a winter cake?

Head in the Clouds said...

Very nice job for your first fondant work! I will have to check out the blog you mention. I have made a few really horrible looking cakes. Here's one that I'm kind of proud of.
http://crazy4flying.blogspot.com/2007/10/whats-g1000-discrepancy-heres-hint.html

Ward said...

This cake:

http://www.buzzfeed.com/expresident/cake-dragon

Was made by these guys:

http://www.mikesamazingcakes.com/

We managed a pretty good Dora the Explorer cake for our daughter's 4th birthday, using a "cheater's fondant:"

http://www.whatscookingamerica.net/PegW/Fondant.htm

I'm not sure if this is the site we got the recipe from, but it's about what we did.

Ward said...

Highly recommended classic book on cake decorating:

http://www.amazon.com/Wilton-Cake-Decorating-complete-Encyclopedia/dp/0912696044

Anonymous said...

The heck with how it looks...more importantly, how did it taste and what was the hidden flavor?

Anonymous said...

Cake content is better than cat content!

I guess we can be sure your customer loyality will not go to the extent that is, um maybe... was?... practiced at WalMart? Or should you actually follow WalMart's policies so you are not a target for those who seem to cry about censorship every once in a while?

Anonymous said...

No, the cake is a lie.

(Bonus points for anyone who gets this without clicking on the link.)

Aviatrix said...

The underlying cake is orange with orange filling. I would have done chocolate but I was using a recommended recipe. I think the recommendation really only applied to cakes that were going to be stacked, like a wedding cake, so had to be dense.

It was very rich and stayed fresh under all that icing.

Next one should be chocolate, I agree.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised that there are cake enthusiasts among my readers because a) who doesn't like cake? and b) you guys include specialists in everything else.

Anonymous said...

This link is Eddie Izzard doing his Cake or Death bit, about the church of England.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BNjcuZ-LiSY

jinksto said...

Wow... well done. I hadn't heard of fondant icing, it's certainly something that I'm going to research and try. Thanks for the always enlightening posts...

Scott Johnson said...

"The cake is a lie" is a video game reference of some kind. I know this only because I live with a teenager whose life is video games ... and schoolwork, when there's time. :)

Callsign Echo said...

Is it a Matrix reference? "There is no spoon?" No? Oh, well.

Anonymous said...

'the cake is a lie' is from the computer game 'Portal.'

Anonymous said...

Fondant LOOKS great but tastes like.... well, you'd rather have icing! I like seeing a pretty cake as much as anyone else but find that all that fondant makes it more or less unedible. Am I the only one?!!

Anonymous said...

It's probably way late for this kind of thing but I came across this cake and have to say it's probably one of the coolest I've ever seen. Probably because I like Australia, and the PC12 is one of my favorite airplanes. Furthermore, it ties into the aviation roots of ths blog...

http://www.abc.net.au/reslib/200805/r250654_1029722.jpg

Norman