Tomorrow we will be celebrating many birthdays along with Easter. One family member actually has a birthday tomorrow. I was asked to make the cake so I decided to do a two-tier cake with the bottom layer being the birthday cake and the top layer having a more spring-like theme. I had intended to do more decorations but I've been sick the past several days and had a slightly sick baby, too. So after five hours in the kitchen this afternoon, beginning with making the cake and ending with the fondant decorations, I decided I better finish up and feed the family dinner.
I was able to get four names across the bottom (sending a shout out right now to my sister Ann and my nephew Luke for having nice short names...thanks!), each separated with a fondant candle.
Now that I've had a few attempts working with fondant, I thought I'd share a few things I really like about it.
1. A lot of people seem to like the taste. That is a bit of a relief to me because I am not particularly fondant of it. (I know...really bad joke. ; ) Some day soon I'm going to attempt to make my own. I've already purchased the supplies to try it; I just haven't had time.
2. I prefer to buy white fondant and add my own color. At first I was hesitant to do this but fondant takes color so well...and easily! (You might want to wear decorating gloves when doing this because your hands take color easily too. : ) When doing this I recommend the old rule of "Start with a little; you can always add more." I had intended for a much more pastel look on this cake, but ended up with really bold colors. It still came out ok. It just wasn't what I had planned for. (Here's a picture with better lighting so you can see what I'm referring to.)
3. I really like that fondant is very much like playdough in that you can always re-roll and remold it. There were a few times when I messed up with the fondant molds in doing the letters and trim. No problem. Simply re-roll and put it back in the mold. EASY!
Other notes:
This is the second time I've tried a two-tiered fondant cake and neither time have I used supports and had no problems. I'm guessing that's because I used 6-inch and 8-inch pans. If I went bigger, I would probably have to dowel it. But for these sizes at least I could get away with no dowels.
The cake is almond flavored, filled with lemon curd, and frosted with an almond flavored butter cream.
Happy Easter!
