More Gumpaste and Fondant Practice

Wilton changed up their classes this summer, and I figured I would probably learn something new and get a little more practice from the new Gumpaste and Fondant course. In the class we learned how to make a big bow, some flowers, and how to cover the cake and board in fondant. I had purchased some chocolate fondant a few months ago but didn't get around to trying it so I knew I wanted to use that for the final cake, and I came up with the plan to do a chocolate and teal look for the cake. I took the Modern Decorations class in the middle of this one so I also decided to use the stencil. And, even though I knew I wouldn't have a lot of time to get the cake done because I was doing a cake balls class the night before our final class I still decided to try a new recipe with lots of parts.

So, lets start with the recipe I chose. Since I knew it needed to go well with the chocolate fondant I went with the Chocolate-Covered Strawberry Cake from Rose's Heavenly Cakes. Since I knew time would be an issue I made the cakes the Sunday before and froze them:

First problem was the filling called for strawberry butter which I couldn't find here so instead of using the simple substitute I searched online for a strawberry butter recipe and made my own. It tasted good on its own but didn't give much strawberry flavor to the cake so I think it might have been too different from the one in the jar.

The next issue was that I wasn't sure if the chocolate frosting in the cake recipe was going to work under fondant. After talking to the instructor at my cake balls class I decided to go with a chocolate ganache instead which added yet another thing which I had never made before. I found a recipe which looked pretty simple in my Martha Stewart Cupcakes cookbook, and after making it I will definitely have to try that again on some of her cupcakes. It was amazingly simple to make.

The other big issue I ran into that night was the merengue. I guess I just need more practice, but every time I go to add the hot sugar to the egg whites it hardens before I can mix it in. I ended up having to redo the sugar. In the end I think the filling turned out as well as possible with my choice of strawberry butter.

I really love how nice the cake looks with just the ganache on it. I will definitely try making a cake sometime that is covered in just ganache.

So, the next day at class I got the cake covered in fondant and got my cake board covered and did one of the stencils. I ran into so many problems that night with all of those things that I wasn't able to finish the cake until the next morning. It ended up looking really nice.

Unfortunately Daniel and I were the only ones who got to enjoy it because I didn't have work that day and didn't get it done in time for Daniel to take with him. We ended up throwing out quite a lot of cake because we just can't eat that much cake ourselves. I think my limit is really a couple pieces. Next time I will definitely plan better, and I will have to try this recipe out again without the substitutions. Either way I love the coloring of the slices: