christmas cake decorating
Recipe Developed by Charlotte White
Decorating a Christmas Cake can be a joy. The key is to allow enough time and not have anything else requiring your attention! If reading my instructions leaves you scratching your head, watch my live demonstration on the California Raisins Facebook page again and let me talk you through the process.
There is no magic involved here, just a few tricks that I have picked up over the years. Once you have your cake covered, you can embellish it with shop-bought plastic pretties or get ambitious with simple sugar flowers or make a few penguins from icing – if you can make it out of modelling clay, you can make it out of icing.
Sugar paste is the most common icing used to cover celebration cakes. It is also known as fondant icing in the US or ‘ready to roll’ icing and is made from a mixture of sugar and glucose. Not all sugar pastes are equal so it is worth experimenting with different brands to find a taste you enjoy and a texture that you can work with.
Prep:
30 mins
Cook:
0 mins
Serves:
1 Cake
method:
1
Begin by flipping your cake over so that the bottom becomes the top. Notice the perfectly straight and smooth surface that you have to work with! Brush the top of the cake with warmed apricot jam.
2
Roll out enough marzipan to cover the top of your cake, using plenty of icing sugar to make sure it does not stick to the worksurface.
3
Put the jammy surface of your cake on top of the marzipan and cut around the cake using a pizza wheel. Flip the cake back over and use your smoother to iron the marzipan on top of the cake.
4
Brush the sides of the cake with apricot jam and roll out a long strip of marzipan, long enough to wrap around the cake.
5
Use the pizza wheel to cut one long straight edge in your marzipan and wrap the section around the cake with the straight edge flush against the worksurface. There will be an amount of marzipan standing above the top of the cake.
6
Using a sharp knife, cut away the excess pressing your knife towards the centre of the cake. If you keep the knife nice and flat, you should end up with a nice sharp top edge. Set the marzipanned cake aside for 24 hours in a cardboard cake box if you can allow it time to firm up.
7
Brush the entire surface of your cake – top and sides – with cool boiled water or a clear alcohol (the liquid must be sterile to prolong the life of the cake). The marzipan needs to be sticky for the sugarpaste to adhere. Ensure that you brush every inch of the cake as dry patches can lead to air pockets appearing beneath the icing. Set the cake aside while you prepare the sugarpaste.
8
Knead your sugarpaste on a clean surface – if you find that your hands are getting sticky or hot, dust a small amount of icing sugar onto your hands only, like the weightlifters do. Kneading too much icing sugar into your sugarpaste will dry it out.
9
Once you are happy that your sugarpaste is warmed through and malleable, dust your work surface with icing sugar and place your kneaded paste on top.
10
Lay your marzipan spacers either side of your sugarpaste on their lowest height setting. These spacers should always be within the length of your rolling pin to guarantee an even thickness of sugarpaste all over your cake. You have finished rolling out when your rolling pin reaches the top of these spacers.
11
Use your non-stick rolling pin to roll out your sugarpaste in long, fluid strokes. Get into the discipline of rolling once forward, once back, and then turning your sugarpaste by a quarter turn. This will ensure that you are getting an even roll and allow early detection of any sticking to the work surface. If you find that your sugarpaste is starting to stick, just throw a small amount of icing sugar underneath, keep calm, and carry on.
12
When your sugarpaste is fully rolled out and your rolling pin has reached the top of your spacers, check that you have rolled out a large enough circle to cover your cake. An 8” cake with a 4” drop will need a circle of sugarpaste with a 16” diameter.
13
Lift your paste onto your cake. I slide my hands and forearms underneath my sugarpaste, fingers flat and together so that my hands are flat little paddles then, with my arms in the centre of my sugarpaste, I can lift quite safely and securely. Using your arms as a centre point, lift your sugarpaste to just above your cake until your arms are in line with the centre and gently remove your arms out to either side, allowing the icing to fall onto the surface of the cake between your arms.
14
Using the fleshy part of your palm, gently press along the top edges of your cake, securing that top edge of sugarpaste. Doing this fairly quickly will prevent any pesky cracks appearing.
15
Work your hand around the sides of your cake, starting at the top edges and working your way to the bottom, always smoothing in upwards strokes. Smoothing down can put stress on your sugarpaste and cause cracks and tears. You will know that you are done when you can feel the work surface beneath your hand.
16
If you find that your sugarpaste is forming folds and creases, don’t panic! Treat your sugarpaste like fabric and open up any folds with one hand, smoothing the paste back onto your cake with an upward stroke from your free hand.
17
Cut away any excess sugarpaste from the bottom of your cake using a pizza wheel and leaving an inch of excess remaining. Knock this remaining inch of excess sugarpaste into the bottom edge of your cake until you can see a clear line running all the way around – this is your ‘cut here’ line. Be bold and run your pizza wheel into this guideline all around your cake. By tapping the paste into the bottom edge, you will ensure a perfect line of paste from the top of your cake down.
18
Use your straight edge smoother as a little iron to smooth out the surface of your sugarpaste. With the long straight edge of your smoother flush against your work surface and the paddle of the smoother gently pressed against your cake, work your way around the cake two or three times and over the top.
19
I recommend that you leave your perfectly covered cake overnight before decorating. This prevents any damage to your perfect surface, which will set harder overnight.
20
A simple festive ribbon wrapped around the bottom edge of your cake will have it picture-perfect and ready for any embellishment you can dream up.
ingredients:
• apricot jam (warmed in a pan or in the microwave)
• 1kg marzipan
• 1kg sugar paste
• icing sugar for dusting
You will need
• pastry brush
• 16” non-stick rolling pin (or larger)
• marzipan spacers
• pizza wheel
• sharp knife
• straight-edge smoother
• ribbon
