Let them eat cake!

Mom's birthday cake.

Disclaimer: I am not a cook or a cake decorator.

I made this cake for my mom for her birthday. (It was good practice for SB's birthday which is coming up in May.) This was my first attempt at decorating with fondant...decorating period. Turns out I'm not so good at it. I have no prior experience and have only read one book about using fondant. (It was mostly pictures.) I figured it would be like working in clay. Not so!

Hidden (or obvious) flaws in the above cake:

• The round disks on the bottom are covering the worst attempt at blending the fondant into itself. There were a lot of excess folds left over and I could not get the seams to merge...so I covered them with dots.
• The clumpy round balls on the ledge of the second layer are there to fill in the large gap that would not close. I tried covering the entire cake instead of one layer at a time. Unfortunately this kept the fondant from clinging to the sides and making corners. I decided to fix it by scoring the corners and pressing them in the creases. The fondant began to pull away and left a large gap around the whole bottom of the second tier. Thus the round clumpy balls. Tasty! (A thought...Tasty and Nasty are one letter apart.)
• The corners are not all at right angles.

What did I learn from this?

• Practice more with forming the fondant around each layer before attempting anything for public viewing (and eating.)
• Cover each layer one at a time.
• Draw a sketch before sitting there for hours trying to figure out what to practice.
• Wear a back brace. One cake puts ten years of wear and tear on the back.
• Start before 8:00 pm.
• Pay someone to do SB's cake if the next practice one turns out as bad.
• Appreciate those who decorate cakes well.