There are a million different cake decorating techniques, cake designs, and new cake trends that we come across every day. With each one, there are certain skills you need to master in order to create a cake that’s too beautiful to eat!
There’s something so satisfying about successfully decorating a cake with the image you had in mind before you even baked the cake! Especially when it’s a design you’ve never made before.
You may be even more eager to try new cake-decorating techniques and designs. But first, let me take you through the complete guide to decorating cakes so we can learn some key information and introductory techniques to set you up for success!
BUTTERCREAM CAKES
Most layer cakes need a sugary filling, and buttercream frosting is one of the most common choices. Buttercream frosting is also necessary to coat the outside of the cake! You can add sprinkles, royal icing decorations, fondant decorations, edible images, and buttercream piping decorations.
types of buttercream frosting
Have you ever purchased a container of frosting from the grocery store and checked the ingredients? There’s usually sugar, of course, water, oil, and some preservatives you’ve never heard of. Then when you try to make it yourself, you quickly find a basic recipe with powdered sugar (icing sugar), salt, butter, and vanilla extract. Easy, right?
There are actually many types of buttercream frosting, and the style with the ingredients previously mentioned is called American Buttercream. Other popular types of buttercream are Swiss Meringue Buttercream and Italian Meringue Buttercream, and both use granulated sugar instead of confectioners’ sugar (powdered sugar).
To make a meringue-based buttercream, room-temperature butter is added to the meringue and whipped until a buttercream consistency is achieved.
ITALIAN MERINGUE VS SWISS MERINGUE BUTTERCREAM
Italian Meringue Buttercream involves cooking a simple syrup (sugar and water) until the sugar has dissolved and has reached a temperature of 243 degrees Fahrenheit (117 degrees Celcius). While the simple syrup is cooking, egg whites are beaten to a soft peak. The syrup is slowly added to the egg whites, and when the meringue has cooled to room temperature, the fat (butter and/or shortening) and flavour are added.
Swiss Meringue Buttercream requires the egg whites and granulated sugar to be beaten in a stainless steel bowl over a pot of simmering water, or a double boiler. Once the sugar has dissolved, it is transferred to the mixing bowl to be whipped at high speed until it has cooled down. The fat and flavouring are added at this point, in the same manner as Italian meringue.
While these methods of making buttercream increase the time cake decorating, they tend to be less sweet since they don’t use powdered sugar. Though, our American buttercream recipe mimics the taste of a meringue-based buttercream, since we use a lot of whipping cream to reduce the sweetness! It kind of tastes like whipped cream! Try it out and let us know how it worked out 🙂
decorating cakes with buttercream frosting
It’s easy to forget that buttercream itself is actually very versatile, and it doesn’t only have to be a smooth outside finish.
Though, to achieve the smooth finish look with buttercream, you need a cake decorating turntable and a cake scraper. Check out our YouTube tutorial with detailed instructions for covering a cake with smooth buttercream frosting.
You can also find different cuts of cake scrapers at your local cake-decorating store. These cake scrapers don’t have a smooth edge, but cut-outs that will create texture to the cake. Some cake scrapers have a jagged edge – use this type of cake scraper to create a rustic look!
A popular cake design trend is striped cakes. These striped cake scrapers scrape off lines of buttercream that you can fill with another colour, sprinkles, or design. While this takes some practice (like all techniques), one tip I’ve learned is to pop the cake in the freezer for about 10 minutes after you’ve used this type of cake scraper.
Then, when you pipe on a new colour of buttercream frosting to fill in the lined gaps, the 2 colours of buttercream won’t blend into each other and look messy.
Another buttercream decorating technique only requires a small offset spatula. Once your cake is covered with smooth buttercream frosting, lightly apply pressure onto the cake with the tip of the spatula while spinning the cake on a turntable, and gradually raising the spatula to create a seamless line around the cake.
Take a look at my Instagram reel below as an example:
That Instagram reel brings us to another cake design – ombre cakes! It shows an easy cake decorating technique that anyone can make and it can only be achieved with buttercream frosting. Gradually adding white buttercream to the coloured buttercream helps you get that smooth ombre transition.
To make life even easier, use a disposable pastry bag to pipe each layer of colour onto the cake. This makes it easier to get each shade onto the cake effortlessly, and you don’t have to keep washing the same pastry bag.
The last buttercream layer cake design that I’d like to mention also only requires a large offset spatula. You can create a more rustic look by adding some “blobs” of buttercream all over the cake. You want to be messy with this cake decorating technique, which can actually be difficult when you’re used to being neat and tidy!
Check out our YouTube tutorial for a rustic cake!
These buttercream cake designs only cover a few possibilities of what you can do – there are also rosette cakes, painted buttercream cakes, drip cakes, and more – by the way, check out our complete guide to drip cakes. The reel below shows how the white chocolate drip recipe works!
EDIBLE IMAGE CAKES
Don’t you think it’s amazing that edible images exist? Using edible ink, edible images can be printed on edible paper, like frosting paper or wafer paper. These images can be applied directly onto a buttercream cake. Or, you can stick them onto fondant, and attach a toothpick or skewer so you can stick them into a cake (instead of a 3D figure).
There are some bakeries and grocery stores (with an in-store bakery) that can print images for you. Or, you can buy an edible image printer with the edible ink and frosting sheets. But! It’s only worth it if you’ll be using the printer constantly because the ink and printer head clog easily
To stick edible images onto fondant, you can use shortening or piping gel. But don’t use water! It will destroy the image.
Also, if you’re making them ahead of time, keep the images out of the sun. This will cause the image to fade and discolour. Learn from my mistakes!
This is a great alternative to 3D figures, as it saves time and it is cost-efficient for your clients (if you’re a fellow business owner!).
CHANTILLY CREAM CAKES (WHIPPED CREAM ICING)
Whipping cream can also be used to frost cakes, but it can be considered difficult to use. Whipping cream would need a stabilizer, like gelatin, to help hold its shape.
You can also make a Chantilly Cream Frosting, with icing sugar and vanilla. Though, you need to be careful not to overmix the frosting. If it’s overmixed, the frosting will separate and look curdled.
Although whipped cream icing is temperamental, it is a delicious and light alternative to buttercream. It’s a popular choice for fruity cakes, like strawberry shortcake or black forest cake.
FONDANT CAKES
Fondant cakes are normally considered more aesthetically pleasing than buttercream-frosted cakes. But, many people don’t enjoy the taste of fondant. Fondant is a sugar paste that is normally made of water, sugar, and corn syrup.
Sometimes, vegetable shortening, gelatin, or glycerin is added to make it more pliable. There are also many marshmallow fondant recipes available that your taste buds will enjoy!
It may be easier to buy premade fondant, then you don’t have to worry about the texture and consistency. Satin Ice fondant is my personal favourite!
While the taste of fondant isn’t popular, it is great for detailed decorations on cakes. It can also be molded to create 3D characters, or rolled out and cut out to make different shapes.
For some fondant decorations, you do have to wait for the fondant to dry before using it to decorate a cake. For example, when making a 3D figure, you will likely have to make it in stages. If everything is made at one time, it will slowly collapse and not hold its shape.
To help speed up the curing process, you can add some CMC powder to the fondant. But, patience is still important, especially if you’re making a fondant flower (the petals need to stay put on those floral wires!). Also, if you add too much CMC powder, the fondant can start to crack as you work with it. It’s a matter of trial and error, it’s better to add less CMC – similar to when you’re cooking a meal, you can always add more seasoning!
Instead of fondant with CMC, gum paste is the alternative for cake decorations. Though, gum paste tastes worse than fondant! It actually isn’t even meant to be eaten. While gum paste is an ideal option for decorations that will be going on a cake, but should be taken off prior to serving.
Check out this post for a list of cake-decorating tools that are guaranteed to help you with fondant work:
COVERING CAKES IN FONDANT
Other than cake decorations, cakes can be covered in fondant. Fondant-covered cakes are very clean and smooth if done correctly. Covering cakes in fondant is a skill that is extremely easy for some, and extremely difficult for others.
I spent years trying to master this skill, it was incredibly frustrating! But, with practice and the right tools, I no longer have trouble with it.
Fondant can be affected by the temperature in the air, the temperature of your hands, and the amount of time you’re working with it. If you’re working with it too long, it will dry out and you will see “elephant skin” on your covered cake. It can also dry out if your hands are too cold, or become sticky if your hands are too warm.
THE STRUGGLE WITH FONDANT
If you’ve struggled with covering cakes with fondant, I would highly recommend a fondant application system. I purchased mine from Sweet City USA. I believe they’re the original creators of the Pro Mat Fondant Application System (but don’t quote me on that!).
Basically, you would roll fondant between 2 silicone mats. This prevents the fondant from drying out, and removing one mat helps with applying the fondant onto the cake.
It makes life so much easier – trust me, I still use this fondant application method to this day! (mostly because I’m paranoid about the outcome if I don’t use it #scarredforlife).
TIERED CAKES
To create a cake with multiple tiers, the most important thing is: SUPPORT! Dowels, skewers, and cake boards really help support a tiered cake. Without support, the cake will likely collapse into itself – and no one wants that!
Here are a few pointers for creating a successfully tiered cake:
- Tiered cakes can be either buttercream or fondant. A cake filled with Chantilly cream is not stable enough to hold the weight.
- Each cake within a tiered cake needs its own cake board. This makes it easier to cut as well.
- Each cake (except the top tier) needs dowels to support the cake just above it. Let’s say you’re making a 3-tier cake with 10”, 8” and 6” cakes. The 10” cake needs 4 dowels to support the 8” cake. And the 8” cake needs 4 dowels to support the 6” cake.
- There are dowels available for purchase that are specifically made for cake decorating. But if you can’t get a hold of these, bubble tea straws are perfectly acceptable!
- You need one long dowel or wooden skewer to go through the middle of the entire cake. This keeps the cake stable and upright while preventing the tiers from shifting (making it travel-safe!).
- When adding the single dowel in the middle of the entire cake, slowly twist the dowel as it’s going further into the cake. This will help keep it straight and upright.
- Use a large offset spatula to help stack the cakes onto each other.
- Add additional buttercream between the tiers to “glue” the cakes together.
- Make sure you have extra buttercream to fill in the gaps between the tiers. Whether you’re smoothing it out or adding a border.
- Ensure the cakes are cold when stacking them, to avoid ruining the covered cakes.
- Don’t forget that tiered cakes are HEAVY! Always check the weight after adding each tier to make sure you can actually carry it.
We made this Instagram reel to demonstrate!
I love Cupcake Jemma’s videos and recipes! Her videos are so helpful, and her dessert and cake recipes are always scrumptious! She has a great YouTube video on stacking cakes as well!
When it comes to decorating cakes, the possibilities are endless! There are so many different techniques, themes, and cake designs that you can create. I’ve been a cake decorator for 10+ years and I’m amazed that I’m still creating something new every day and learning new techniques.
We hope that we’ve shared some meaningful tips to help you create a beautiful cake! Whether it’s a birthday cake or a tiered wedding cake 🙂
Baking and decorating cakes is definitely a learning process, but there’s nowhere to go but up!
Happy cake decorating!
Mich
Interesting and useful!
Thank you so much! 🙂