Ok heres my problem i own the wilton petal pan set ( they are on page 160 of this years wilton book) ive owened them for years and have only used them twice reason being when i go to frost the cakes they end up looking horrible instead of petals they look like a very bad job on a round cake both times ive done them the cakes were free anyways i just used them two weeks ago for my sister in laws baby shower cake it looked terrible but i didnt have the time to do another cake now my problem i have a lady who heard through my neighbor that i do
wonderful cakes and she told her of the petal cake i made the lady called me begging me to do a 3 tier petal cake and 30 cupcakes for her daughters 16th birthday party im starting to freak out the cake is due next week and i called the lady back and asked if she wanted any different shape and she said oh please i want the petal cake the things that ive tried to make it look more like a petal cake are slow down frosting it as i go around it use thinner frosting frosting it and using a viva towel to try and get the shape and none of those seem to work it seems like there is just to much frosting on the cake but when i go around to take the frosting off some it tears the cake or just takes off the frosting from the outter parts of the petal and where it goes in to form the petal has alot of extra frosting there hope this makes since and sure hope someone can help PLEASE thanks

KAT






























wonderful cakes and she had mentioned that i was doing a petal cake

Those pans have *always* been a problem to ice and the smaller the size the harder to get them to look good.
You could try giving the cake a nice crumb coat and covering w/a somewhat thinnly rolled fondant covering.

BTW: your post is *VERY!* hard to read as you use no periods or anything It's just one LONG sentence in small print.

Since you don't have a lot of time to practice icing it in buttercream, I would go the fondant route. Not that it's exactly easy to cover in fondant, but it should give you a smoother look than trying to ice such an odd shape in bc.

Sharon zambito has a great DVD that cover this type of cake. I think the name is Flawless Fondant

The lady that wants the cake hates fondant and wants it in buttercream. I didnt know that these pans were hard to work with i thought it was just me. Now i dont know what to do. The lady is all excited about a petal 3 tier cake

Kazita i will send you a picture that maybe help you with that, I just have to find the book where i saw that technique on buttercream

Oh any pictures or videos on how to do this petal cake would be so greatly appreciated

kazita,
I had a similar problem with a cactus shape cake I made. I found the buttercream needed to be a bit firmer than usual. I then washed my hands thoroughly, dipped them in warm water and formed it like you might with clay. You can see the cake in my photos. I hope this helps!
Good luck!

Susan

Ok so im excited and stressed about the cake now. I figure theres no way im gonna be able to sleep without trying to do at least on layer of this darn cake again so i now am cooking a cake , yes i know its late at night and i have to let the cake cool ill put it in the freezer while i make the fosting and like i said i have to try yet again to see if i can get it right. I also am a member of my cake school and sent them a email and the had a few suggestions so with the suggestions here and the ones from them im gonna try a trial run. Wish me luck and ill let you all know how it turns out good or bad

The Wilton pans don't have very defined petals. You have to really work at it to get the shape. It's either Fat Daddio's or Magic Line, but one has a much more defined petal pan.

The way that works best for me when using the Wilton petal pans is to use a fairly large star tip and pipe the icing on the sides that way. Smooth and remove doing a nice crisp crumb coat. Let is crust (or refrigerate for a bit) and then smooth on the additional icing. Doing that enables me to see exactly where the indents are for each petal. My daughter gave me a headache when she decided she wanted the petal shape for her wedding cake and she also wanted it all in buttercream. It took a bit of time to get the icing really smooth and the petal shape defined but it can be done.

Just as an idea, why don't you make a small cake out of the smallest petal pan and practice with that until you master it. HTH

If the problem is that the cake pan isn't well defined, can you trim it a little to fix that?

Also- remember you don't have to actually bake a cake to practice. Make your icing and slather it right on the pan. This way you can scrape and redo all you like.

Hmm, I just had a thought. What if you used rolled buttercream? I've never tried it but it sounds like it has the texture of fondant but is really buttercream.

Rolled buttercream is that with a spong roller? Ive seen it done on a video on my cake school. Well the meduim cake is crumb coating and in the frig, toomorrow i will try again and see if i can get it. Another thing that is bothering me is i am probably losing money on making this cake, its a cousin of my neighbors and my neighbor told her that i have to die for cakes and that my buttercream is out of this world , if course than they told me that they had very little money to spend on the cake and cupcakes to boot and delivery that 30 miles away




























































and i have a big truck that sucks gas like crazy . So i am probably actually losing money on the deal

Sorry for the last post beind messed up, im on my nook and sometimes it skips around and wont let me fix it. I swear if this cake doesnt turn out than shes getting a round cake. Thanks for all the input and im still open to more ideas if anyone can find a video of someone doing this cake in butter cream that would be great


KATZITA

Oh my just went on Fat Daddios website WOW could i spend alot of money on there and they do have a petal set that looks like it would work so much better than the wilton .when my birthday comes ill be makimg a wish list for hubby to get hehe

Recipe for Rolled Buttercream. It's not using the little roller to smooth the buttercream, it's an actual recipe that is similar to to fondant but is actual buttercream.

http://www.wilton.com/forums/messageview.cfm?catid=7&threadid=144080&FTVAR_MSGDBTABLE=

Tip #1: Ice and smooth every other petal then go in and fill in the missing ones (ice the top first)

Tip #2: cut the cardboard using the pan as a template then use the upside down method to ice the cake (you'll be able to see the board and use that to guide you)

You *DON'T!* let the customer dictate to you the price.
You must act like a business right from the start. And charge for delivery unless them want to pick up themselves.

cheatize i didnt see where you had suggested to trim the cake my husband also suggested to do the same thing, so at the last second on this last practice cake i decided to trim the petals to make them more defined YEP!!!! IT WORKED thank goodness now i have to back the three tiers forst them make the cupcakes and deliver all on saturday whew i sure was stressing. thanks to every one for the help i LOVE this site oh and im also a member of my cake school i love that site too i think its completely worht the $30 per year to join.

Kat

Woo hoo!!!!!!!!
Now I know what to do if I ever use/find my pans.
I love figuring out something BEFORE I do it myself. lol

Kakeladi, yeah i really messed up on the price thing my husband is pretty unhappy about that. The reason that i said that i would deliver is because its a party at a camp ground and the lady was gonna take the cake with her on friday and put it in the back of her truck and leave it there over night , i wasnt about to have everyone getting sick from my cake plus have the risk of a 3 tier cake riding in the back of her truck and my husband works out of town so when she told me that it was just the next town over i thought ok not that bad of a delivery , well my huband has to work next weekend and wont be home and my gps kept saying
No matches found so my husband drove me way way way out in the coutry and showed me where this camp ground is its twice the distance that i thought it was, and like i said i have a gas eating truck. Plus of course i was out of high ratio shorting so we had to go buy that in the next town over yesterday . Another thing that anger me was i guess this lady was complaining to my friend about how much i was charging her, i actually nice as i could told her she was way more than welcome to get the cake else where and she quickly said that she was just comparing prices around town but soon found out that she got more than a deal from me, she even had the nerve to tell me that she was willing to pay twice of the amount of what i told her of course this is after i had already been guilty into the dirt cheap price that shes getting. Oh and shes also one of those great people that say its just cake it shouldnt cost that much at all and she had priced a cake at walmart but they wouldnt make a cake that she wanted. So this brings up another problem, she had mention that she could probably get alot of cake orders for me with all the people she knows , what the heck am i suppose to do if they do start calling wanting dirt cheap prices?
















no matches found for this camp ground my husband knew right where it was but because he wont be with me

Again my nook messed up disregard that bottom part of the post

You sound like such a nice person, and I'm almost miffed that these people are taking advantage of you. Be sure, you'll be known as the lady who does cheap cakes. There would be lines of people complimenting your oh so glorious cakes that they just have to have for $0.30 per serving (including delivery).

I suggest that you get this order done with and then take some time to figure out your costs so that you're ready for the next cheapskate she or your neighbor will send. NEVER give a quote until after you've figured out your cost including what it would cost you to deliver.

You might also want to consider a contract so that the next ignoramus wanting to leave a cake in the trunk of her car, on a camp ground, in the middle of summer will know that she will be liable for everything that goes wrong after the cake has changed hands and she proceed with her ridiculous plan.

I'm glad the pan issue got sorted. Good luck.