fondant cake

(Just cuz, hehe)

For the twins birthday coming up this month instead of buying or having someone else make a cake we decided to have me give it a go. Some of you probably saw the theme or ideas I have for their party and if you didn't you can check it out here. :) 

I figure why not document our little experience.  I'll go through it an explain things we messed up or can do better next time now that we know.

Yesterday- after acquiring a recipe from a friend of ours- my mom and I attempted the cake (she has the better kitchen of us two and also has all the baking supplies that I don't).  OK, the cake part was easy, depending on what ever cake you want, my mom had already made a simple white cake and had it ready for us.   Then with a little bit of Milk, powder sugar, and a touch of this and that we made just regular white frosting with a hint of cherry flavoring.  

We covered the cake, sides and all, with frosting to prevent crumbs from getting in the fondant.  (That and the fact we need some messy icing for when they break into the cake!)

After sticking that in the fridge so the icing could harden a little, it was on to the fondant.

Here is the recipe I got:

(I did research the web and found several different ways to make it, one of them buttercream)

‎16 oz. bag mini marshmallows
2-3 tbs. water
1 tsp. lemon juice (optional all it does it make it a little less sweet)
1 tbs. light karo syrup
approx. two pounds Powder Sugar
lots and lots of crisco!

In a large microwave safe bowl, coat with crisco, then add the marshmallows and water, Microwave at 30 second intervals stirring in between until marshmallows are melted. Take out and add karo syrup and lemon juice (if using). If you want to make the entire batch one color add it here, you can also flavor the fondant with your typical candy flavorings here as well if you'd like just make sure you don't use the lemon juice. Then it's just a matter of kneading in the powder sugar until it reaches the right consistency. You want it nice and firm. Make sure you coat everything the fondant will touch with crisco (including your hands!). Best if refrigerated overnight, but make sure to use an air-tight container! Air is fondants worst nightmare! When you go to use it you will have to work with it for a while to get it as pliable as you'll need. If you don't want to color it all one color, you just separate the block into sections of as many colors as you need and knead in the food coloring.

 After using a bowl to mix the main ingrediants- mallows, water and karo and some red coloring- you can choose to use your hands to knead in the powdered sugar, which we did.  Later, after how hard it was starting to become we realized if you do have a mixer-which we did-and it had a kneading attachment-which it did-that using that would have been a better route and should work just the same.

Once it was to a decent consistency it was time for dinner and like the directions say you should let it sit over night, but instead we just popped it in the fridge covered for a couple hours.  

 After dinner we took it out and at first thought we should put Crisco down on the counter top and my hands, but the fondant was looking a bit greasy.  In fact my hands didn't really need the crisco at this point because the fondant was very manageable. So this is were we learned the more powdered sugar the better it became, looks wise as well as easier to manipulate.

We didn't add enough powdered sugar to the batch until we had already covered the cake, but now we know.

After flattening to what we thought was a decent width and diameter, I slowly picked it from the counter and draped it over the cake.  Smoothing out the top and tapering down to the bottom. It was surprisingly easy to get it over the cake and in position.

But that's when we realized something, when I originally iced the cake with the cherry flavored icing, I didn't realize and had left it un-smooth and un-even in several areas.  This was a problem because once draped over the cake, the fondant took the form of everything underneath.  Oops. =p  Also I ended up cutting the fondant a bit too short in spots, so definitely try to compensate for what you will want to tuck into/under the cake a bit. 

After finishing with the cutting and attempts at smoothing we placed it in the freezer for about an hour or so.  Until we decided it was time to eat.  This is where we learned some more..

The fondant was a bit thick, so next time when we are making the cakes I need to make sure it's a lot thinner.  With it being so thick it was a lot to chew on and to everyone who tried it thought it was a little over powering.  

We also decided that instead of the lemon juice we want to try some flavoring next time. Not that it tasted bad, because it tasted like marshmallows..yummy..but it would have been nice to maybe have a little bit of extra cherry flavor in there or something. 

As for the coloring, we originally placed the coloring in at the start so it was all pink instead of all white. But, if you do plan on using several colors which we plan to for the cakes on their birthday.  After messing with the left overs and adding some more powdered sugar it was surprisingly easy to knead and we didn't see that it would be a problem to make a whole batch white, then separate and add coloring by kneading later.

In the end everyone had some and seemed to enjoy it although the fondant was a bit thick.  It was a great first attempt-in my honest opinion- especially when neither of us had tried it before and I never bake, haha.  

It kind of makes me excited to make the final cakes, to mess with coloring, flavoring and cutting shapes and molding to make what we want. 

❤ Happy Monday!