Cake decorating help

[legal girl]

I'm decorating a cake for my Mum's 60th and have a couple of queries. I have icing to roll out - its in a big block at the moment. Will it be easy to roll out or are there any tips you can give me to make it easier? Also, I need to write "Happy Birthday" and have some writing icing - would this work if I made a paper stencil and wrote through this?

[bimbo123456]

Hi Legal Girl.Make sure that the icing has been kneaded for a while to make it pliable. Use a little cornflour or icing sugar to stop it sticking to the rolling pin and the surface you are using. You don't say how big your cake is. If it is large and rectangular it would probably be better to roll out and ice the sides and the top separately, then ice over the joins with royal icing. If it is a normal sized cake roll out to allow about 1cm large circle than you need, fold gently over the rolling pin and place over the cake starting at the base and then over the top. If you are using a sponge you will need to put jam (I use apricot) or marmalade on the cake to make the icing stick. If you are marzipanning the cake, before icing moisten the marzipan with vodka (ideally) and this will help the icing stick to the marzipan. Once your flat icing has dried it would be best to draw your letters on using your stencil and a pencil, then ice over. If you are not confident enough to ice straight on to the cake make up some basic royal iciing, pipe the outline of the letters onto silicone paper (baking paper, not greaseproof) and leave to dry for about and hour. Add a little boiled water to the icing until it is just runny. Either ice or use a small spoon to fill in your outlines. Leave for a couple of days. Then the letters will peel off the background and you can put them where you like. This works well with numbers as well. Good luck with your cake. Sorry this is such a long answer. Hope it helps!! :)

[Jillius]

Look on ebay and type in Cake Toppers. There are some lovely ideas.

[legal girl]

Thanks for your helpful hints bimbo. As I'm new to this cake decorating lark I've cheated and bought a ready iced cake and am just rolling out the icing for shapes to decorate the cake with. Your advice has really helped, thanks.