What am I doing wrong? everytime I ice a cake with bc the crumbs seem to go all over the place, I usually bake my cakes, let them cool and ice them, I have tried doing a crumb coat but I still get some crumbs on my icing, I want it to look crumb free!!! especially with chocolate cakes.
Any advice will be greatly appreciated!!!!!!!!!
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chocolate cakes are a major pain.

for me...

step 1 -- use a pastry brush to brush off all the crumbs I can from the cake, the cake board (my mouth -- joking!) etc.

step 2 -- crumb coat --- a little thicker for chocolate -- using the large icing tip (#789)

step 3 -- after crumb coat has hardened -- then final coat again w/ the icing tip.

step 4 -- smooth -- right now I use the warm spatula method

that icing tip helps a lot!

One thing my mom taught me(she has worked in a bakery for 11 years) is to not pick up my spatula when applying the icing. I only pick it up to add more, if you use small or long strokes and avoid picking up the spatula it wont pull the cake crumbs in the icing.

I tend to have the most trouble when I'm frosting a cake or a part of the cake that has been cut. For whatever reason, even if I do a crumb coat and I go back with the final coat, I find that the frosting will want to peel off.

I have managed to almost completely avoid this problem by using the cake icer tip. I find that it puts just the right amount of icing on a cake. There's enough to allow you to skim some off in the smoothing process while still leaving enough to have a nicely iced cake. Because you put the icing on with a tip that never touches the cake, you don't ever stir up any crumbs. Once the icing is on the cake, you just smooth it gently from there, without any reason to touch the actual cake (no crumbs!). Never had a problem with crumbs since I started using it.

i agree with tracey...the icing tip works great!

i agree with tracey...the icing tip works great!

I used the icing tip once and found that I went through a lot more icing then I would normally use to ice a cake... Is that normal?

I've been fairly lucky I guess, I just ice and make sure the spatula never comes in direct contact with the cake, just icing! Apply icing liberally, then scrape off excess.

Chocolate cakes are always a PITA! I have the hardest time icing them because of the crumbs. I need to get one of those icing tips.

thank you so much for the tips, I will try the 789 tip and see what happens , whats the warm spatula method?

I love the big tip 789 too, it really works a lot better for me.