I am making a chocolate cake for an upcoming church party and I'm having a bit of trouble deciding on the outside of the cake.

I'm either going to do a chocolate cake with chocolate buttercream filling, iced in chocolate ganache and decorated with white chocolate buttercream

OR

a chocolate cake with chocolate ganache filling iced in chocolate buttercream and decorated with white chocolate buttercream.

Part of me really wants to do the ganache on the outside, but I've never covered an entire cake with ganache before and I've never piped decoration onto ganache before. Does IMBC adhere well to ganache? Any tips from anyone who has done this? TIA!

I like to use the following combo and have had rave reviews on it...
Chocolate cake filled with chocolate pudding, iced with chocolate b/c and then topped with chocolate ganache on top and running down the sides a little, you will still see the buttercream on the sides. Don't get your ganache too runny. I use 12 oz semi-sweet choc. (Ghiradelli) and 8 oz heavy cream. Accent with chocolate dipped strawberries for color or use sugared grapes.

If you try to decorate on top of ganache, BE CAREFUL. You can't undo. It never sets up to the point that if you touch it, it will not leave a mark.

Hope this helps and hope my reply is not too late for your project. Let me know if you need anything else.

my vote is for the chocolate bc as filling and iced in chocolate ganache, not only super yummy but the contrast of color of the ganache with the white decorations I think is elegant. I have decorated ganache with regular buttercream that came out great. Anything with chocolate bc, ganache and white choc. is tops in my book.

Sarah Bernhardt Chocolate Glaze is the best (ganache)! Recipe on CC under recipes. I have done a dripped top with it and also completely covered a three tiered wedding cake recently with it. To completely cover just pour the chocolate begining in the center top of the cake and keep moving in a circular motion. Make sure the cake to be covered is set up on a cake pan that is smaller in circumferenc (sp?) and that it has parchment paper underneath it. If you do this you can achieve a perfectly smooth surface on the cake without ever having to touch it with a spatula. The choc. that spills nto the parchment can be scraped up and used for something else very easily. Just make sure you pour in a circular motion. Do not stop and try to go back and forth over a side. If the side isn't covered completely just keep pouring slowly in that circular motion until it is! Hope this makes sense. After it sets up you could pipe decorations onto it. But if you touch it with your fingers you could leave a finger print. It does set up nice in about 20-30 minutes but remember it is chocolate. Good luck!

Thanks everyone! I'm gonna go for the ganache on the outside dec with the white choc IMBC and the reg choc IMBC for the filling. I realy want to do some pipe work on this cake and I love the look of the dark chocolate with the ivory contrast. I'm planning ahead - cake isn't for until the 5th of Feb. I'll post pics when I'm done!