Cake Decorating: Choosing the Right Frosting

Hi, my name is Amanda Oakleaf. I am owner, head baker, decorator of Amanda Oakleaf Cakes in Winthrop, Massachusetts where we do custom cakes of all kinds -- wedding cakes, birthday cakes, sculpted cakes. Anything you can think of we can make it into a cake. And today I will be talking to you about cake decorating. When decorating a cake, there are three basic kinds of frostings. We have the butter cream, royal icing, and fondant. Butter cream is your standard cupcake frosting that you would use to fill and frost a cake. It's kind of got an off-white texture. If it is a pure white butter cream, you can be a little suspicious because the off-white color is created by the butter in the cake and the vanilla, so if was pure white, you might be suspicious. Is there butter in there? Is it real vanilla? Ours has both, so it's easily spreadable. It holds its peaks. It holds its shape. It's good for making roses, and decorations like that. Second we have royal icing. Royal icing is pure white. This has no fat in it. It's a frosting that dries hard after you decorate with it. It kind of dries hard like a candy. It's made of meringue powder, four egg whites, and powdered sugar, and a little bit of water, and you can adjust the consistency by adding more or less water to be more spreadable. This also holds its shape very well. You can do really delicate or extreme work. You can pipe out a lot of details, scroll-work onto a cake, and it will dry hard in the end, that if you bump the cake accidentally the royal icing won't smear as butter cream will. Royal icing is also used as a glue. If you want to hold two pieces of fondant together on your cake, a little royal icing in between will dry hard in the end and will hold the pieces together. Lastly, we have fondant. Fondant is a sugar dough that can be rolled out to cover a cake. It can be molded to be figurines, flowers, bows, ribbon. Anything you want. So it's basically like a play-doh. Ours is a homemade marshmallow-based fondant so it actually tastes pretty good. It's just marshmallows, powdered sugar, and then you have a sugar dough. So, all three of these together make a well-decorated cake.

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[Helgapayawalvergara]

Hi I am new at cake decorating. I would like to know how to cover a cake with royal icing that would give the cake a finish similar to fondant.

[TheCraphater]

how does fondant taste is it too sweet?

[LiRa1992]

@MaRaTheMeyvn Thank you. =)

[MaRaTheMeyvn]

@LiRa1992 Hmmmmm... to be honest that's not much info to go by. :D But what I think it is is either royal icing with less sugar or just a mixture of confectioner's sugar and water.

[LiRa1992]

@MaRaTheMeyvn Hi there.. I need help in identifying the type of icing I ate last few weeks ago at my friend's house... It tasted very nice. It's not too soft and not too hard. I can see powdered sugar in there but I'm not sure what else did she added to make such consistency. It tasted nice and I was hoping to know about it.

[LiRa1992]

@MaRaTheMeyvn Hi there.. I need help in identifying the type of icing I ate last few weeks ago at my friend's house... It tasted very nice. It's not too soft and not too hard. I can see powdered sugar in there but I'm not sure what else did she added to make such consistency. It tasted nice and I was hoping to know about it.

[MaRaTheMeyvn]

@amina123ish For making just for fun at home try pre-made frosting or butter cream. For cakes whipped cream works very well too.

Not sure what you meant by that icing thing, but... for icing a cake use royal icing. For icing cupcakes and cookies just a mixture of confectioner's sugar and water is enough. If you're making separate addable decorations like roses or snowflakes, make royal icing with a little more sugar that usual.

[amina123ish]

I am new at baking...what kind of frosting would you suggest for making cupcakes and cakes just for fun at home? Also to ice a cake and cupcakes for decorations with tips what kind of icing are we suppose to use in the bag to ice?