I have a wedding in June that the bride is using a Greek theme and wants a basket weave cake with bunches of grapes draping off the edges. I need help! I don't know what to make the grapes out of or how to attach them to the cake in clusters. Can someone help me?

What an undertaking! I know a lot of people probably use gumpaste for these types of things, but for me I would use fondant (maybe stiffened with a little gumpaste) to make the grapes (purple or green?) and then maybe paint on them to make them look more realistic.

To group them you may have to use some wire - I know there are probably people on this site that have grouped flowers together this way? I don't know if you'd use RI, fondant, or colored wire tape to cover the wire so it is brown, but I know you'll get some suggestions for this from others.

GOOD LUCK!

I'm bumping you I need to know the same exact thing for a First Communion cake.

http://www.discountsugarflowers.com/SearchResult.aspx?KeyWords=grape These are pre-made. Expensive but it would be a quick solution. There are directions for butter cream grapes at the Wilton site under decorating techniques.

Hi there ~

I'm making a Tuscan themed wedding cake for our daughter 7/7/07.

I experimented making the grapes out of fondant without much success. The color looks alittle flat.... I bought a grape cluster mold online and although the clusters are small....we are putting the top potion of draped sements and painting a tuscan scene on the front and adding pillars from a mold to frame in the picture on 2 of the layers, a monogram plaque on a layer also.
I added luster dust to the grape clusters and so far that is what we like.

A Food Network show did a cake with grapes. (I think it is Simply homemade- Sandra Lee?) Anyway she used REAL grapes and coated them in a fine granulated sugar and placed them on the cake. It looked very nice! I think her theme was white - champagne- so she used white grapes, but it would work just as well with the darker grapes too. She kept some in clumps to drape off the side of the cake, and had tiny clusters of 3 or 4 to place here & there around the layers. Just another option!

I'm a big fan of sugar. I would use blown sugar balls in a grape color and do it that way, but then again, I have fun doing stuff like that, most people think it's too time consuming. If you want the directions let me know, or someone in the candy forum probably posted a thread about it at one time or another.

I found this website with directions on how to make blown sugar balls if you are game...

http://www.recipecottage.com/candy/blown-sugar.html

Color your gumpaste a lighter shade of what you want the finished color to be. Pinch off small pieces of paste about the size of a marble, roll into a ball and then roll the top part between the edges of your two hands to form it into a slight oval at the top. Take a floral wire # 26 gauge, bend a tiny opened hook at the top with your fingernail or pointed pliers. Dip just the hook into gum glue, thread up through the grape from the oval end, go up about 3/4 of the way, then pull back out just a little bit until you feel that hook catch in the gumpaste, pinch the paste where it meets the wire at the bottom of the grape to secure it to the wire, stick each wired grape into a block of styrofoam to dry overnight. Make lots of them because it takes about a dozen to make one cluster. Next day, tape each wire with green floral tape. If you haven't used it before, cut a small strip and pull it from both ends to stretch it and release the glue. Roll it tightly around the wire just under the grape, then tape all the way down the wire at a angle, pulling the tape tightly as you go. Cut off any excess and pinch at the bottom of the wire to secure. You can either dust the grapes with petal dust individually before taping them together into clusters, or after you have them clustered. Use a bit darker shade of petal dust than the color of the gumpaste. Hold one wired grape in your fingers, with the wire up in the palm of your hand, lay one more grape to the side but up a little higher than the first one, tape it in place with floral tape, lay another grape to the other side in the same position as the second one, tape. Almost like a triangle. Continue to do this until the cluster is the size you want. 1 grape, 2 grapes, almost a triangle each time you add another row. Now tape all of the wires together to make the stem. Dust the grapes with dry petal dust with a dry paint brush, then steam the cluster over a pan of boiling water. This will set the petal dust so it doesn't flake off on your cake icing and it will also give the gumpaste a slight sheen or shine. Stick the wired cluster into the block of styrofoam and don't touch the gumpaste area until they have completely dried or it will remove the dust and leave white spots. You can also take a piece of green floral wire in about a #24 gauge and wrap it tightly in a spiral around a paintbrush handle or pencil. Push the spiral tightly together, then slide it off the pencil and gently pull from both end to expand the length, cut into about 4 sections and tape these to single grapes wires before you put them together into a cluster. It will give you the effect of tendrils, just don't do too many, no more than 4 to a cluster and in different sections of the cluster as you tape the grapes together.
Here is a photo of what I am trying to describe. If you look closely you will see the green wire spirals or tendrils.