Springtime = Caketime

With the exception of the past two days, we've been blessed with gorgeous spring weather recently! Taking that into consideration, I used the spring as a theme in a recent cake I made for a school celebration. The cake was my favourite chocolate cake, the recipe for which you can find here, or on the recipes page with several of my other faves!

What I really wanted to talk about was how simple it was to make this cake, though some of the details look quite intricate. What you'll take away from this post is not only a simple way to make pretty cakes, but also that I'm a bit lazy (well, not lazy per se, but I sure wouldn't take the time to craft each flower on my own).

To start, I covered the cake in chocolate buttercream, and the followed that with a layer of fondant. This was a simple marshmallow fondant made from green mini-marshmallows.

Next, I divided gum paste into three sections, colouring them blue, pink, and brown respectively. I've come to find that gum paste is much nicer to work with than fondant, so I chose it for the decorations as opposed to the fondant that I'd usually used previously.

Now, here's the real trick - gum paste molds. They are quite possibly the easiest thing to use, honestly. There are several different Wilton ones to choose from, and I chose a spring themed one. Simply dust the molds with corn starch (I'm sure icing sugar would work well too) and then push the gum paste into the molds. Carefully remove the gum paste and trim any areas that may need trimming. Voila, easy peasy.

To attach the gum paste, I used a small brush and sum water but you can of course use gum glue. Once the pieces were attached, I painted sugar dust onto the flowers for some extra dimension. The cake was a hit, and I think (despite my protest that it was much easier than it looked) I was given much more credit than necessary for this quick little cake. It really does look like spring in a cake though, and tasted alright too!

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